Die genetische Herkunft der Europäer

Schädel der ungefähr 7.000 Jahre alten Bäuerin aus Stuttgart, Deutschland. Es fehlt der untere rechte Backenzahn, aus dem die DNA gewonnen wurde. (Bild: Joanna Drath, Universität Tübingen)

Forscher vergleichen Genome ursprünglicher Jäger und Sammler sowie früher Bauern mit denen heutiger Menschen: die Spuren der Europäer führen zu Ahnen aus drei Populationen

Der Beginn der Landwirtschaft und die Domestizierung wilder Tiere, die vor rund 11.000 Jahren im Nahen Osten ihren Anfang nahmen, hatten einen enormen Einfluss auf das Leben der Menschen. Jäger und Sammler wurden vielerorts von sesshaften Bauern abgelöst. Die Populationen wuchsen und schufen so die Voraussetzungen für das Entstehen größerer Städte und komplexer Gesellschaften. Die archäologischen Nachweise legen nahe, dass sich der Übergang zur bäuerlichen Lebensweise in Mitteleuropa vor rund 7.500 Jahren vollzog, gleichzeitig mit dem Auftreten der Linienbandkeramik, der ersten jungsteinzeitlichen Kultur in Europa.

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'Emmets Post' excavation blog - weeks 1-2

When Olaf mentioned that he was going to be digging a round barrow in its entirety on the edge of Dartmoor in August, I did everything I could think of in order to secure a place on the crew. This is an incredible and very rare chance to investigate what hopefully may yet turn out to be a relatively undisturbed Bronze Age ring cairn/round barrow c. 2000 BC or so. I have been interested – to an almost manic degree – in British prehistory and specifically megaliths for more than 20 years now. I am a self-confessed stone circle, longbarrow, standing stone, stone row and rock art-loving fanatic and proud of it.

Long before I began a career in archaeology in the late 1990s I travelled to England with fanciful ideas of our prehistoric ancestors and only a handful of sites under my belt to ponder. I had been to Avebury and Stonehenge and the like but, amazing as these sites are, they were covered in throngs of people. I first went to Dartmoor in the summer of 1997 and fell madly in love with every aspect of this lonely and enchanted land, and this love drove me around much of the rest of the British Isles to see more. Being back in Dartmoor for a month has given me the chance to hike around the Moor in the evenings to new and ever more mysterious sites. This place is really a paradise for hikers and lovers of the prehistoric past. This near-obsession back in Canada at the dawn of the new millennium drove me to pursue a degree and career in archaeology. Almost 20 years later I am back here again been given the chance to fully investigate something from the period, people and type of place that turned me into an archaeologist in the first place.

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Murder 'comes naturally' to chimpanzees

Groups of male chimpanzees patrol the borders of their territory in single file

A major study suggests that killing among chimpanzees results from normal competition, not human interference.

Apart from humans, chimpanzees are the only primates known to gang up on their neighbours with lethal results - but primatologists have long disagreed about the underlying reasons.

One proposal was that human activity, including destroying habitats and providing food, increased aggression.

But the new findings, published in Nature, suggest this is not the case.

Instead, murder rates in different chimp communities simply reflect the numerical make-up of the local population.

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Stonehenge: children revealed to be the metal workers of prehistoric Britain

Research suggests children wrecked their eyesight embellishing weapons and jewellery with minute scraps of gold

Daggers at the Wiltshire Heritage Museum, Devizes, discovered in 1808 in Bush Barrow, Salisbury Plain, the richest and most important bronze age grave ever excavated in Britain. Photograph: Sam Frost for the Guardian

Scientists believe that some 4,000 years ago children as young as 10 wrecked their eyesight embellishing weapons and jewellery with minute scraps of gold, creating dazzling pieces so fine that the detail can barely be picked out with the naked eye. They were some of the best prehistoric metal work ever found in Britain.

The children may have been working in Brittany, where the largest concentration of daggers decorated with the tiny gold pins have been found, but the finest of all was excavated more than 200 years ago from a burial mound half a mile from Stonehenge.

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Europeans drawn from three ancient 'tribes'

The modern European gene pool was formed when three ancient populations mixed within the last 7,000 years, Nature journal reports.

Blue-eyed, swarthy hunters mingled with brown-eyed, pale skinned farmers as the latter swept into Europe from the Near East.

But another, mysterious population with Siberian affinities also contributed to the genetic landscape of the continent.

The findings are based on analysis of genomes from nine ancient Europeans.

Agriculture originated in the Near East - in modern Syria, Iraq and Israel - before expanding into Europe around 7,500 years ago.

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New bog body discovered in Co. Meath

A new, partially intact bog body has been discovered by Bord na Mona workers in Co Meath. Archaeologists from the National Museum of Ireland (NMI) have confirmed that it is working on a find of human remains in a bog near the border with Co Westmeath, at Rossan bog.

 Bog body remains of adult discovered last weekend at Rossan Bog, Meath  [Credit: National Museum Ireland] 

Archaeologist Maeve Sikora told the Irish Examiner that workers from Bord na Mona came across the remains. 

“Archaeologists and conservators from The National Museum of Ireland have been on site investigating the findspot of archaeological human remains in a bog in Co. Meath, near the border with Co. Westmeath,” Ms Sikora said.

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New bog body found in Rossan, Co. Meath

New bog body remains (photo National Museum of Ireland)

Exciting news. The partial remains of a bog body has been uncovered in Rossan bog near Kinnegad in Co. Meath. The find was discovered by Bord na Móna workers and subsequently excavated by a team of archaeologists, led by Maeve Sikora of the National Museum of Ireland. Although as yet undated the remains were found in an area that has previously produced bog body remains (Moydrum Man) that were radiocarbon dated to the Early Iron Age (700-400 BC).

This latest addition to growing a corpus of Irish bog bodies will hopefully reveal as much information as two recent peat land discoveries. These aforementioned bog bodies, Old Croghan man and Clonycavan man, form the centre piece of the excellent Kingship and Sacrifice display at the National Museum of Ireland. What is striking about these remains is their fantastic state of preservation, something which is characteristic of bog bodies in general. This is primarily due to the cold, acidic, oxygen-free conditions that persist beneath peat bogs and which prevent decay and mummify human flesh.

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Groundwater tied to human evolution

Insert shows with arrow the location of study area in eastern Africa. Map of the Northern Tanzanian Divergence Zone depicts the East African Rift System (EARS), containing Lake Natron (north), diverging around the Ngorongoro Volcanic Highland massif and splitting into two separate rift valleys (Lake Eyasi on west) and Lake Manyara (on east). Prevailing wind is from the east. Olduvai basin lies to the west of and in the rain shadow of Ngorongoro.

Credit: Map made by Sara Mana, http://www.geomapapp.org; from Cuthbert et al., doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0107358.g001

Our ancient ancestors' ability to move around and find new sources of groundwater during extremely dry periods in Africa millions of years ago may have been key to their survival and the evolution of the human species, a new study shows.

The research -- published in the journal PLOS ONE -- combines geological evidence from the Olduvai sedimentary basin in Northern Tanzania, which formed about 2.2 million years ago, and results from a hydrological model.

It shows that while water in rivers and lakes would have disappeared as the climate changed due to variations in Earth's orbit, freshwater springs fed by groundwater could have stayed active for up to 1000 years without rainfall.

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NEOLITHIC NECROPOLIS CONTAINS TWENTY MONUMENTAL TOMBS

Hypothetical reconstruction of the plain occupied by the cemetery. © Laurent Juhel / Inrap

A team of archaeologists is currently conducting excavation work on 20 hectares of land in Fleury-sur-Orne (northwestern France), which is earmarked for residential development. This site has revealed an important Middle Neolithic (4500 BC) necropolis containing twenty monuments and some intact burials.

During the Middle Neolithic new types of monuments appear: constructions of earth and wood, varying in length from a few dozen to several hundred metres. These monumental tombs, the first of their kind are called “Passy” – named after the eponymous site found in Yonne (Burgundy).

Monumental funerary architecture

These large, elongated structures are bounded by ditches which may be associated with fences, and a mound entombs the deceased. In a break with past traditions, these large monuments suggest that a type of hierarchy has been introduced into society.

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Stonehenge researchers discover site is much larger than previously thought

Stonehenge. Photograph: Geert Verhoeven/University of Bi/PA

Stonehenge stood at the heart of a sprawling landscape of chapels, burial mounds, massive pits and ritual shrines, according to an unprecedented survey of the ancient grounds.

Researchers uncovered 17 new chapels and hundreds of archaeological features around the neolithic standing stones on Salisbury Plain, Wiltshire, including forms of monuments that have never been seen before.

Brought together for the first time in a digital map of the historic site, the discoveries transform how archaeologists view a landscape that was reshaped by generations for hundreds of years after the first stones were erected around 3100BC.

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Une nécropole du Néolithique moyen à Fleury-sur-Orne

Une équipe d’archéologues de l’Inrap mène actuellement, sur prescription de l’État (Drac Basse-Normandie), une fouille de 20 hectares à Fleury-sur-Orne, dans le cadre de l’aménagement de quartiers d’habitation par Normandie Aménagement et l’agglomération de Caen-la-Mer. Le site révèle une importante nécropole du Néolithique moyen (4500 avant notre ère) contenant une vingtaine de monuments funéraires dont un tertre encore intact.

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Archaeologists Find Humans Were Eating Snails 30,000 Years Ago

Paleolithic humans of present-day Spain may have eaten snails as much as 30,000 years ago, or 10,000 years earlier than inhabitants of Mediterranean regions, according to research by Javier Fernández-López de Pablo from Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social and colleagues.

The researchers discovered land snail shell remains dated to about 30,000 years ago at the site of Cova de la Barriada, Spain. Groupings of complete shells from a large land snail species were found in three areas of the site, corresponding to different time points. They studied these remains by investigating patterns indicating likley land snail selection, consumption, and accumulation at the site, and then analyzed the shells' decay, fossilization process, composition, and age at death by measuring the shell sizes.

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Humans Did Not Wipe Out the Neanderthals, New Research Suggests

Neanderthals went extinct in Europe about 40,000 years ago, giving them millennia to coexist with modern humans culturally and sexually, new findings suggest.

This research also suggests that modern humans did not cause Neanderthals to rapidly go extinct, as some researchers have previously suggested, scientists added.

Neanderthals are the closest extinct relatives of modern humans, and lived in Europe and Asia. Recent findings suggest that Neanderthals were closely related enough to interbreed with ancestors of modern humans — about 1.5 to 2.1 percent of the DNA of anyone outside Africa is Neanderthal in origin.

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New dates rewrite Neanderthal story

Our ancestors may have passed on technological innovations to the Neanderthals

Modern humans and Neanderthals co-existed in Europe 10 times longer than previously thought, a study suggests.

The most comprehensive dating of Neanderthal bones and tools ever carried out suggests that the two species lived side-by-side for up to 5,000 years.

The new evidence suggests that the two groups may even have exchanged ideas and culture, say the researchers.

The study has been published in the journal Nature.

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Before they left Africa, early modern humans were 'culturally diverse'

A new study provides fresh insights into the life of early modern humans before they left Africa following a massive comparative study of stone tools.

Researchers have carried out the biggest ever comparative study of stone tools dating to between 130,000 and 75,000 years ago found in the region between sub-Saharan Africa and Eurasia. They have discovered there are marked differences in the way stone tools were made, reflecting a diversity of cultural traditions. The study has also identified at least four distinct populations, each relatively isolated from each other with their own different cultural characteristics.

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Archaeologists compare Neolithic Kent site to Stonehenge, find Bronze Age funerary monument

A Neolithic ditch which became a huge funerary monument when it was enlarged with an outer ring during the Bronze Age has been found on housing development grounds in Kent

Archaeologists suspect a “sacred way” could have led to a henge 6,000 years ago at Iwade Meadows, to the west of the Kent industrial town of Sittingbourne.

Positioned on a north-west slope, the 30-metre diameter structure is one of several prehistoric monuments on a north-west slope above the Ridham fleet stream running through the centre of the site.

“Its purpose is not known,” says Dr Paul Wilkinson, of excavators SWAT Archaeology.

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Remains of at least two bodies found in ancient grave

Archaeologist Paul Murtagh excavating the Bronze Age burial cist in which the remains of at least two bodies were found

Archaeologists have discovered the remains of at least two bodies in a Bronze Age burial cist in a remote area of the west Highlands.

They were previously aware of one body in the ancient grave on the Ardnamurchan peninsula but they have now found more bones than could belong to another person.

A skull found during an earlier archaeological dig at Swordle in 2010 was dated as being from around 1700BC.

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Mystery of the ancient Gauls found dumped in a pit

Eight skeletons including two of children dating back to the Iron Age have been found in good condition in France. 

Eight skeletons dating back to about 500BC have been found in an ancient  grain silo near a Celtic salt mining site in Marsal, eastern France  [Credit: AFP/Getty Images] 

The extraordinary archaeological discovery was made in Marsal, in the east of the country, in the Lorraine region, close to the border with Germany. 

Dating back to around 500BC, all were exhumed from a wet, boggy area which was once the site of extensive salt mines, but is now surrounded by an industrial estate. 

It is excavated most summers by a team led by Laurent Olivier, curator of the National Archaeological Museum at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, near Paris.

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Découverte d’une occupation néandertalienne en bord de Saône

Une séquence stratigraphique exceptionnelle

Ce site préhistorique est implanté sur une butte lœssique dominant l’ancien lit de la Saône. Unique en Rhône-Alpes, cette séquence sédimentaire qui associe des dépôts d’origines fluviatile et éolienne, renseigne sur l’évolution de la Saône durant le Pléistocène supérieur (128 000-11 000 ans). Initialement haute de 8 m, elle est constituée d’une succession de paléosols et de lœss : le plus ancien, épais de plus de 2 m, est daté entre 55 000 

et 35 000 ans, c’est-à-dire durant la fin du Paléolithique moyen. La fouille révèle une faune riche répartie sur trois niveaux et associée à des silex taillés abandonnés par les Néandertaliens.

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Major finds unearthed on Hinkley bypass dig

Important finds dating back to the Iron Age and Roman period have been uncovered at the site of a new bypass to be built as part of the Hinkley C project. 

Archaeologists working at the site of the Cannington bypass  [Credit: Latitude Photography] 

Archaeologists working at the site of the Cannington bypass revealed their discoveries to local residents on Thursday when EDF Energy and Somerset County Council invited local stakeholders to take a look. 

The dig is being carried out at the site of a planned Cannington bypass which will be built to help serve the proposed Hinkley Point C nuclear power station. 

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Greek tomb at Amphipolis is 'important discovery'

Archaeologists know that major events took place in the area in the years after Alexander's death

Archaeologists unearthing a burial site at Amphipolis in northern Greece have made an "extremely important find", says Greek PM Antonis Samaras.

Experts believe the tomb belonged to an important figure dating back to the last quarter of the Fourth Century BC.

A large mound complex has been unearthed at the Kasta hill site in the past two years.

Lead archaeologist Katerina Peristeri said it certainly dated from after the death of Alexander the Great.

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Europe's oldest village sought under Greek bay

PlanetSolar press officer Julia Tames walks across the deck of the MS Turanor PlanetSolar,

The world's largest solar-powered boat has arrived in southern Greece to participate in an ambitious underwater survey that will seek traces of what could be one of the oldest human settlements in Europe.

The Swiss-Greek project starts next week and archaeologists hope it will shed new light on how the first farming communities spread through the continent.

Working near a major prehistoric site, they will investigate a bay aptly called Kiladha — Greek for valley. The area was once dry land and archaeologists operating off the MS Turanor PlanetSolar hope it may contain sunken remains of buildings from Neolithic times, when farming started, about 9,000 years ago.

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Fowl play: Neanderthals were first bird eaters (Update)

Cut-marked bone (ulna) of Rock Dove specimens from Gorham’s Cave 

Credit: Ruth Blasco et al., Scientific Reports

Neanderthals may have caught, butchered and cooked wild pigeons long before modern humans became regular consumers of bird meat, a study revealed on Thursday.

Close examination of 1,724 bones from rock doves, found in a cave in Gibraltar and dated to between 67,000 and 28,000 years ago, revealed cuts, human tooth marks and burns, said a paper in the journal Scientific Reports.

This suggested the doves may have been butchered and then roasted, wrote the researchers—the first evidence of hominids eating birds.

And the evidence suggested Neanderthals ate much like a latter-day Homo sapiens would tuck into a roast chicken, pulling the bones apart to get at the soft flesh

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Schoolboys unearth golden hair tress more than 4,000 years old

A GOLDEN hair tress dating back 4,300 years has been unearthed by a group of children taking part in a summertime archaeological dig.

Experts say the pre-Bronze Age ornament is one of the most significant recent archaeological finds ever discovered in the UK.

Mini-archaeologists Joseph and Aidan Bell and their friends Luca and Sebastian Alderson were taking part in a community excavation at Kirkhaugh, Northumberland, when they saw a glint of gold in the soil.

To their astonishment it turned out to be an ancient hair tress which is one of the earliest pieces of metal work dug up in the UK.

The schoolchildren, aged between seven and ten, had been on a dig arranged by the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONB) Partnership's Altogether Archaeology project, when they stumbled across the treasure.

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More on Gallic chariot tomb discovered in France

A combined team composed of archaeologists from the Ardennes departmental archaeology unit and from Inrap has just finished excavating the aristocratic Gallic grave at Warcq (Ardennes). 

The chariot tomb at Warcq in the process of excavation  [Credit: © Denis Gliksman/Inrap] 

Curated by the State (Drac Champagne-Ardenne), this site was part of the investigation of the route of the A304 motorway being constructed by the Dreal between Charleville-Mézières and Rocroi. 

This type of aristocratic grave, containing a ceremonial or war chariot, emerges in the 7th century B.C. and disappears with the end of the Gallic period. 

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Produktion von Salz und Pökelfleisch in der Bronzezeit

Ausgrabung bei Wörbzig: Großer bronzezeitlicher Grubenkomplex mit drei rechteckigen Herdgruben. Foto: Klaus Bentele © LDA Sachsen-Anhalt

Schon in der Bronzezeit war die Salzgewinnung ein bedeutender Wirtschaftsfaktor im südlichen Sachsen-Anhalt. Das zeigen die zahlreichen Funde von Salzsiedekeramik aus dieser Epoche. Auch bei den aktuellen Ausgrabungen bei Wörbzig im Landkreis Anhalt-Bitterfeld fanden die Archäologen des Landesamts für Denkmalpflege und Archäologie Sachsen-Anhalt zahlreiche Bruchstücke von Briquetage. Daneben fanden sich zahlreiche Herd- oder Gargruben, in denen vermutlich Schweinefleisch gepökelt und so haltbarer gemacht wurde.

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DANISH IRON AGE VILLAGE TO BE RE-BORN

Lyngsmose og Hover viewed from the north in 1993.  Image: Palle Eriksen

Situated in a Danish cornfield on a crossroads between Ølstrup and Hover lies the remains of Lyngsmose, an Iron Age village of international importance now buried beneath the soil. However an exciting collaboration means that Lyngsmose will spring to life again after 2000 years.

A joint steering committee between the various parish organisations is to administer a large renewable energy grant from the Environment and Technology Committee to facilitate the realisation of a common dream to “re-visualise” the 2000 year old space into the present.

Currently, acquisition of the land is in progress along with building permits and the creation of a joint Lyngsmose Association.

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Lindow Man: Gruesome discovery who became 'international celebrity'

Lindow Man is the best preserved peat bog body to be found in Britain

Thirty years ago, a peat cutter working in the Cheshire countryside spotted what he thought was a piece of wood trundling along a conveyor belt.

Tasked with the job of keeping the belt free of debris, he threw it away, but as it hit the ground, the dirt fell from it and the remains of a human leg lay in the summer sun.

That gruesome discovery on 1 August 1984 led to Rick Turner, the newly-appointed county archaeologist, being called to the site on Lindow Moss.

He says what followed were "the most exciting days of my archaeological career".

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Ice age lion figurine: Ancient fragment of ivory belonging to 40,000 year old animal figurine unearthed

The fragment on the left makes up half the head of the animal figure on the right, showing that the “lion” was fully three-dimensional, and not a relief as long thought.

Archaeologists from the University of Tübingen have found an ancient fragment of ivory belonging to a 40,000 year old animal figurine. Both pieces were found in the Vogelherd Cave in southwestern Germany, which has yielded a number of remarkable works of art dating to the Ice Age. The mammoth ivory figurine depicting a lion was discovered during excavations in 1931. The new fragment makes up one side of the figurine's head, and the sculpture may be viewed at the Tübingen University Museum from 30 July.

"The figurine depicts a lion," says Professor Nicholas Conard of Tübingen University's Institute of Prehistory and Medieval Archaeology, and the Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment Tübingen. "It is one of the most famous Ice Age works of art, and until now, we thought it was a relief, unique among these finds dating to the dawn of figurative art. The reconstructed figurine clearly is a three dimensional sculpture."

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VIOLENT AFTERMATH FOR THE WARRIORS AT ALKEN ENGE

Four pelvic bones on a stick and bundles of desecrated bones testify to the ritual violence perpetrated on the corpses of the many warriors who fell in a major battle close to the Danish town of Skanderborg around the time Christ was born.

Denmark attracted international attention in 2012 when archaeological excavations revealed the bones of an entire army, whose warriors had been thrown into the bogs near the Alken Enge wetlands in East Jutland after losing a major engagement in the era around the birth of Christ. Work has continued in the area since then and archaeologists and experts from Aarhus University, Skanderborg Museum and Moesgaard Museum have now made sensational new findings.

“We have found a wooden stick bearing the pelvic bones of four different men. In addition, we have unearthed bundles of bones, bones bearing marks of cutting and scraping, and crushed skulls. Our studies reveal that a violent sequel took place after the fallen warriors had lain on the battlefield for around six months,” relates Project Manager Mads Kähler Holst from Aarhus University.

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Wine-cup used by Pericles found in ancient grave

A cup believed to have been used by Classical Greek statesman Pericles has been found in a pauper's grave in north Athens, according to local reports Wednesday. 

The cup was likely used in a wine symposium when Pericles was in his twenties, and the six men  who drank from it scrawled their names as a memento, experts say [Credit: To Vima] 

The ceramic wine cup, smashed in 12 pieces, was found during building construction in the northern Athens suburb of Kifissia, Ta Nea daily said. 

After piecing it together, archaeologists were astounded to find the name "Pericles" scratched under one of its handles, alongside the names of five other men, in apparent order of seniority.

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Prehistoric dairy farming at the extremes

Finland's love of milk has been traced back to 2500 BC thanks to high-tech techniques to analyse residues preserved in fragments of ancient pots. 

Corded Ware sherds [Credit: Finnish National Board of Antiquities] 

The Finns are the world's biggest milk drinkers today but experts had previously been unable to establish whether prehistoric dairy farming was possible in the harsh environment that far north, where there is snow for up to four months a year. 

Research by the Universities of Bristol and Helsinki, published July 30 in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, is the first of its kind to identify that dairying took place at this latitude -- 60 degrees north of the equator.

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Violent aftermath for the warriors at Alken Enge

Four pelvic bones on a stick are shown. Credit: Peter Jensen, Aarhus University

Denmark attracted international attention in 2012 when archaeological excavations revealed the bones of an entire army, whose warriors had been thrown into the bogs near the Alken Enge wetlands in East Jutland after losing a major engagement in the era around the birth of Christ. Work has continued in the area since then and archaeologists and experts from Aarhus University, Skanderborg Museum and Moesgaard Museum have now made sensational new findings.

"We have found a wooden stick bearing the pelvic bones of four different men. In addition, we have unearthed bundles of bones, bones bearing marks of cutting and scraping, and crushed skulls. Our studies reveal that a violent sequel took place after the fallen warriors had lain on the battlefield for around six months," relates Project Manager Mads Kähler Holst from Aarhus University.

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Mycenaean vaulted tomb unearthed in central Greece

A Mycenaean vaulted tomb has been discovered near Amfissa in central Greece during the course of an irrigation project. 

Found in Amifissa, the vaulted tomb is the first of its kind discovered in Phocis and one  of the few in Central Greece [Credit: To Vima] 

The tomb presents all the features typical of this type of structure: a long dromos 9 metres in length with stone-built sides,  a deep prothalamos or vestibule and a circular burial chamber which has a maximum internal diameter of 5.90 metres. 

Although the superstructure of the dome had collapsed, the walls of the chamber maintain a height of almost three metres.

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Ötzi's non-human DNA: Opportunistic pathogen discovered in Iceman tissue biopsy

A team of scientists from EURAC in Bolzano/Bozen together with colleagues from the University of Vienna successfully analysed the non-human DNA in the sample.

Credit: Frank Maixner (EURAC)

Ötzi's human genome was decoded from a hip bone sample taken from the 5,300 year old mummy. However the tiny sample weighing no more than 0.1 g provides so much more information. A team of scientists from EURAC in Bolzano/Bozen together with colleagues from the University of Vienna successfully analysed the non-human DNA in the sample. They found evidence for the presence of Treponema denticola, an opportunistic pathogen involved in the development of periodontal disease. Thus, by just looking at the DNA, the researchers could support a CT-based diagnosis made last year which indicated that the Iceman suffered from periodontitis. The results of the current study have recently been published in the online scientific journal PLOS ONE.

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Extensive remains of vast Mycenaean citadel revealed

A team of archaeologists is excavating the remains of a vast ancient Mycenaean citadel, known as Glas or Kastro (castle). Under the leadership of Associate Professor Christofilis Maggidis of Dickinson College and the auspices of the Athens Archaeological Society, teams of specialists have been systematically surveying the imposing, island-like, flat-topped bedrock outcrop that rises 20-40 meters above a surrounding plain with a summit area stretching 49.5 acres at the northeastern edge of the Kopais basin in southeastern Greece. The area is estimated to measure ten times the size of the ancient citadel of Mycenaean Tiryns and seven times that of Mycenae. 

Aerial view of Glas showing the massive cyclopean walls enclosing and defining  the site of the ancient remains [Credit: C. Maggidis] 

“I first excavated at Glas in 1990 as a graduate student with my mentor, the late Spyros Iakovidis,” said Maggidis. “The unparalleled size of the citadel, its connection with the gigantic drainage project of Kopais, and the discovery of such important but few remains in the citadel indicating that the rest of the citadel was left vacant puzzled me since then.”

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Burgenland's 'Stonehenge' discovery

Reconstruction of circular ditches at Heldenberg, Lower Austria. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

In a sensational find for Austrian archaeologists, aerial photographs taken two years ago on the southern outskirts of the Burgenland town of Rechnitz have revealed the existence of circular trenches dating back to the Neolithic Period.

The mysterious millennia-old sites are currently being surveyed by experts who believe they once served both as a giant calendar and a place for rituals. 

 

It appears that circa 5,000 BC there was a large circular area in a field on the southern outskirts of Rechnitz, surrounded by wooden poles. It was only after aerial photographs were taken of the district that remnants of an ancient trench system became visible. 

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Have archaeologists discovered an 8,000-year-old HUMAN BRAIN? Skull unearthed in Norway 'harbours fragments of grey matter'

Archaeologists have found what they think is an 8,000 year old human skull in a dig in Norway. Shown here is the skull embedded in soil, but the team did not dare to scrape all the loose sand from it in fear of destroying the surface of it. It is thought to have belonged to a child of under ten years of age

The investigation took place due to a planned building of a big conference centre called the Oslofjord Convention Center.

The excavation project involves two sites from the same interval of the Mesolithic era, about 6,000 BC, approximately 8,000 years ago.

Little is known of this period of the Stone Age in eastern Norway, making the sites of particular interest.

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Romanian cave holds oldest human footprints

Human footprints found in Romania’s Ciur-Izbuc Cave represent the oldest such impressions in Europe, and perhaps the world, researchers say. 

Human footprints such as this, found in a Romanian cave almost 50 years ago,  are much older than originally thought, dating to around 36,500 years ago [Credit: D. Webb] 

About 400 footprints were first discovered in the cave in 1965. Scientists initially attributed the impressions to a man, woman and child who lived 10,000 to 15,000 years ago. But radiocarbon measurements of two cave bear bones excavated just below the footprints now indicate that Homo sapiens made these tracks around 36,500 years ago, say anthropologist David Webb of Kutztown University in Pennsylvania and his colleagues.

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Iron Age house unearthed in Jersey

An iron age settlement has been unearthed in Jersey after a two month excavation. The work on the site in St Clement has discovered objects dating back over 2,000 years. 

After a two month excavation, a settlement site in St Clement has been discovered as well as  objects dating back more than 2,000 years [Credit: channelonline.tv] 

Field Archaeologist, Robert Waterhouse, said the site had produced evidence of the first Iron Age house to be discovered on the island. 

He said the site dates from the 2nd Century BC to the early 1st Century AD and was likely a private home.

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Dating the second timber circle at Norwich

In the late 1990s two remarkable Bronze Age timber circles were discovered on Holme Beach. One of these – Seahenge – was excavated in 1998 and 1999. Since the excavations the second circle has been monitored and evidence of damage by coastal processes has been recorded. 

The second timber circle uncovered 15 years after the first, dubbed Seahenge, was found along the Norfolk coast. The Bronze Age timber circle has been tested by archaeologists and  dates to the summer of 2049 BC.[Credit: © NPS Archaeology] 

In the last year tree ring dating (dendrochronology) has shown the timbers used to build the second circle were felled in the spring or summer of 2049 BC. This means that the timbers were felled at exactly the same time as those used to build Seahenge. The felling date places the construction of both circles early in the Bronze Age.

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French archaeologists discover an exceptional Gallic chariot tomb at Warcq in France

The excavation has currently revealed only the upper levels of this 15 m² funerary chamber. 

© Denis Gliksman, Inrap.

PARIS.- A combined team composed of archaeologists from the Ardennes departmental archaeology unit and from Inrap is currently excavating a Gallic aristocratic tomb at Warcq (Ardennes). Curated by the State (Drac Champagne-Ardenne), this site is located on the route of the A304 motorway being constructed by the Dreal between Charleville-Mézières and Rocroi. 

Starting on 3 June for a three week period, archaeologists and an anthropologist have been working to uncover this chariot tomb. This type of aristocratic tomb emerges in the 7th century B.C. – during the first Iron Age – and ends with the end of the Gallic period. The oldest chariots have four wheels (like that found at Vix), while those from the second Iron Age have only two. The deceased person – who could be male or female – was generally inhumed on the chariot, which was an object of prestige and a symbol of social status. Champagne-Ardenne is famous for such tombs (particularly at Bourcq and Semide in the Ardennes), which are generally dated to the start of the second Iron Age (5th-4th century B.C.). 

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