For Those Interested in Archaeology

What? Scotland and animals but no whisky? I am disappointed...

 

"The word “pyramid” is synonymous with Egypt, but it is actually neighbouring Sudan that is home to the world’s largest collection of these spectacular ancient structures.
Beginning around 2500BC, Sudan’s ancient Nubian civilisation left behind more than 200 pyramids that rise out of the desert across three archaeological sites: El Kurru, Jebel Barkal and Meroe, in addition to temples, tombs and royal burial chambers.
Despite being smaller than the famous Egyptian pyramids of Giza, Nubian pyramids are just as magnificent and culturally valuable. They even offer a crowd-free experience for intrepid tourists.
Built of sandstone and granite, the steeply-sloping pyramids contain chapels and burial chambers decorated with illustrations and inscriptions carved in hieroglyphs and Meroitic script celebrating the rulers’ lives in Meroe – a wealthy Nile city and the seat of power of Kush, an ancient kingdom and rival to Egypt.
These days sandstorms and shifting sand dunes pose the biggest threat to Sudan’s ancient heritage sites. This phenomenon is nothing new, and was even chronicled thousands of years ago...But today the threat has been exacerbated by climate change, which has made the land more arid and sandstorms more frequent. "
Sudan's 'forgotten' pyramids risk being buried by shifting sand dunes


"Archaeologists have uncovered the remains of a possible Indigenous settlement in northeast Florida.
As Matt Soergel reports for the Florida Times Union, researchers from the University of N. Florida (UNF) think they’ve finally found Sarabaty, a local community cited by French and Spanish writers in records dating back to the 1560s. Its exact whereabouts had remained unknown—until now.
According to a statement, the team discovered a range of Indigenous and European artifacts on Big Talbot island, located off the coast of Jacksonville. Coupled with cartographic map evidence, the finds suggest that the site once housed a group of Mocama Native Americans.
“No doubt we have a 16th-century Mocama community,” dig leader Keith Ashley tells the Times-Union."
www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/researchers-may-have-rediscovered-long-lost-indigenous-settlement-florida-1-180977973/

You wonder how many more are waiting to be discovered?
"Archaeologists have discovered 130 homes at an Early Bronze Age monument, suggesting there was a community living around Germany's 'Stonehenge'.
The ancient archaeological site, in the village of Pömmelte, 85 miles from Berlin, is known as Ringheiligtum Pömmelte, German for 'Ring Sanctuary of Pömmelte'.
It consists of seven rings of palisades, ditches and raised banks that would once have held wooden posts. The site has been compared to Stonehenge in Wiltshire.
In the latest excavation of the site, a team including researchers from Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg, found a residential area surrounding the monument.
It was always assumed it was a ritualistic site, but this is the first time they have discovered evidence of permanent occupation within the vicinity of the monument."
www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-9687907/Archaeologists-discover-130-dwellings-Germanys-Stonehenge.html

 

If this was on a Discovery programme four years ago, why are we just hearing about it?
"ARCHAEOLOGISTS were stunned after finding a 10,000-year-old stone circle deep beneath Lake Michigan that appeared to resemble the UK's Stonehenge.
Researchers were taken aback on finding a series of stone circles beneath Lake Michigan. The rocks formed what appeared to be perfect rings, yet were hidden away deep beneath the Great Lake. Lake Michigan is one of the five Great Lakes of America and is deep-rooted in the country's history, sitting in the northeast spanning several states.
Some of the earliest human inhabitants of the lake were the Hopewell Native Americans, whose culture is thought to have declined after 800 AD.
Afterwards, the Late Woodland Native Americans made it their home.
Multiple sightings of the stones prompted researchers, making a documentary for Discovery TV in 2017, to explore the lake's bed and analyse the structure using cutting-edge technology.
Compared to Stonehenge the origin of the stones under Lake Michigan is less obvious."
www.express.co.uk/news/world/1453129/archaeology-news-underwater-stonehenge-lake-michigan-world-stone-circle-uncovered-spt

 

A new human species has been identified in Israel-
"Archaeologists have unearthed a new type of prehistoric human that emerged 400,000 years ago and which is thought to have likely interbred with Homo sapiens.
Skull and jaw fragments of a 'Nesher Ramla' Homo were found at an open-air prehistoric site of the same name at a cement plant near the city of Ramla, Israel.
Researchers from Tel Aviv University and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem have dated the remains to around 140,000–120,000 years ago.
Nesher Ramla Homo's big teeth, skull structure and absent chin make its morphology markedly different to that of modern humans, analysis has revealed.
But it does have features in common with Neanderthals — specifically its teeth and jaw — while its skull resembles that of other archaic Homo specimens.
Thus, the find may answer a big puzzle in human evolution — how Neanderthals came to have Homo sapiens genes long before the two groups met in Europe.
The researchers argue the Nesher Ramla people may be the previously-hypothesised 'missing' population that mated with modern humans 200,000 years ago.
In fact, they likely predated modern humans in the Levant by 200,000 years before overlapping for more than 100,000 years after that."
www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-9722109/Archaeology-Nesher-Ramla-Homo-new-type-ancient-human-discovered-Israel.html

 

Another day, another new human species. Are they on piece work or something?
"Our understanding of human evolution could be 'reshaped' by the identification of a new ancient human that may replace Neanderthals as our closest relative.
Experts led from China's Hebei GEO University came to this conclusion after re-analysing the so-called 'Harbin cranium', which was unearthed back in the 1930s.
First thought from Homo Heidelbergensis, the team now think the near-perfectly preserved skull instead represents an example of Homo longi — the 'Dragon Man'.
Held in Hebei GEO's geoscience museum, the skull — the largest of all Homo species — was found in the Songhua River, near Harbin, in China's Heilongjiang province.
The fossil specimen was hidden for decades in a well, and was only handed over to researchers for study back in 2017.
H. longi had a brain comparable in size to that of modern humans, but sported big, almost square eye sockets, thick brow ridges, a wide mouth and larger teeth. "
www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-9725059/Archaeology-Dragon-Man-150-000-years-ago-replace-Neanderthals-closest-relative.html

 

The newly-reformed Time Team might well be covering it on their youtube channel.

 

I stand corrected- they're re-running old programmes online while trying to raise money so they can pick up where they left off -
Time Team - Watch

 

Should really have put this in the Nothing new under the Sun thread, I suppose.
"Scientists have found the earliest strain of Yersinia pestis – the bacteria that caused the Black Death, a devastating bubonic plague pandemic in the 14th century.
Y. pestis was found in the 5,000-year-old remains of a male hunter-gatherer, dubbed RV 2039, in a region called Rinnukalns in present-day Latvia.
Genetic analysis reveals that this ancient strain was likely less contagious and not as deadly as the medieval version during the Black Death.
This early form of the plague that killed RV 2039, around the year 3,000 BC, likely was a slow-moving disease and wasn't very transmissible.
Over the next 4,300 years, however, the strain evolved to become more deadly to humans, culminating in the catastrophic Black Death in Europe and Africa.
It's though the Black Death – which lasted from 1346 to 1353 – could have killed as much as half of Europe's population."
www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-9736775/5-000-year-old-man-earliest-known-strain-plague.html

 

So the others had immunity? Can this immunity be passed onto offspring?

 

Not entirely sure. It's known that folk who survived a wave of the Black Death had immunity from the next one, so it seems to be possible.

 

I believe they got immunity. Either you die or get immunity.

 

Here you go; it did indeed-
"Scientists examining the remains of 36 bubonic plague victims from a 16th century mass grave in Germany have found the first evidence that evolutionary adaptive processes, driven by the disease, may have conferred immunity on later generations of people from the region.
"We found that innate immune markers increased in frequency in modern people from the town compared to plague victims," said the study's joint-senior author Paul Norman, PhD, associate professor in the Division of Personalized Medicine at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. "This suggests these markers might have evolved to resist the plague."
The study, done in conjunction with the Max Planck Institute in Germany, was published online Thursday in the journal Molecular Biology and Evolution."
www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/05/210518114827.htm

 

Interesting back in my high school days it was a theory kicked around but consider more myth than history and now they say they have proof. Wonder if those guys back then are still around to say I told you so. Its really interesting how history changes or our perception. Like look at what scientist thought how prehistoric animals looked like, like trex and the ankylosaurus. The ank has changed lots over the decades thanks to recent fossil finds of complete remains fantastic fossile finds. I think the most amazing find I the gobi was a tarbosaurus complete with a shattered hip, then near by they find a complete ankylosaurus with a tooth embedded in it the tooth identified as a tarbosaurus tooth. The archeologists were like no way checked the turbos aureus and the tooth was a perfect fit for a broken spot. So they had a story tarbo attacks and mortally wounding or killing it utmost before anky gets a good hit on the hips d shattered it with its huge club tail. Tarbo hurt stumbles toa river to drink dying and falling in and sinks Ito the stilt preserving it. Anky laying ins gully rains bury it under mud and thus anky preserved for future discovery. Too much huh, great finds have been found in the gobi I would love to explore it but rather dangerous and an expedition would cost tens of thousands. So if I strick it rich wanna go, lol

 

Yeah, if you read through this thread you'll see that quite often after I've posted one story about the populating of the Americas or something, about a week later a new one appears that completely contradicts it.
Been on archaeological digs as a volunteer, which usually means pushing wheelbarrows or sifting spoil while the real experts are doing the work. Fun though.
Which reminds me I forgot to post this, which happened recently on my doorstep-
"A road dating from the 13th century was last week uncovered during archaeological work at Stirling’s Coxet Hill.
The hill, by Cultenhove Road – believed to have been a final line of defence for Scottish forces during the Battle of Bannockburn – had never been examined by archaeologists before.
The road, thought to date from around 1270, as well as 3000-year-old quartz workings and an ancient house, were among the finds made by a team of 20 volunteers led by Stirling Council archaeologist Murray Cook.
And there is still much to examine at the hill site, which had been planted as a ‘cockshot’ or hunting wood by King Alexander III in the second half of the 13th century.
Murray said: “It’s amazing that all of this survived next to a modern housing estate and the dumping of several tonnes of rubble and soil from the estate’s excavation."
www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/local-news/excavation-works-reveal-historic-13th-24423405

 

Hey Gordon without guys like you digs would be very unproductive plus guys shifting have found lots. of bits that otherwise would have been missed. Lol look at that kid whose family took him to an emerald mine the kid digs around in the refuse pile and Tadashi finds an emerald cluster the size of a softball estimated to be 300-500-thousand lol guess who paying for their own college fund. Like you might find some valuable teeth or some small fossils fragment, a filangee of some little know species of ape or homosapien. Anyway good luck on your dig can you tell us what the dig is hoping to find. I watched the program about a canyon in Canada they say has thousands of fossils to hundreds or thousands of animals and they were trying to figure out why. They determined the animals were mostly one species and were probably on migration she hit by s flash flood while in the canyon drowning them and the bodies settled to the bottom and covered by mud. Anyway can't remember the species but ancestors to the ceratops. So no shortage of those fossils.

 

Think I saw that one- the animal fell in the river, drowned, then turned turtle because of the weight of the scales on it's back? When the decomposition gases caused it's belly to rupture it sank to the riverbed and quickly became covered in silt. That's why scientist were able to examine its stomach contents etc. Believe it's the only fossilised example of its species ever found.

 

Hey I saw that one too, said a number of anks have been found such. They die body get washed into a river or body of water they sink get covered by mud the mud reacts with the carcas and hardens forming a shell that further protects and preserves the animal till it fossilized. I think that one was in some kind of quarry and fortunately the excavator operator as soon as he broke into it knew it was something special stopped digging and notified someone the local university sent some professors who confirmed it was a valuable fossil find had it dug out and save the broken fragments to restore it completely.
The one I was talking about for all things starts in Korea a large rock with a fossil imbedded in it was found but the creature was only from the back hips to the tail they could not tell what species it was tried to find more of it but couldn't. They tried to reconstruct what the foot looked like and match it to foot prints near the area they had hundreds of fossilized foot prints there. Then the archeologists join a multi national expedition into the gobi, they say it's the archeologists dream, play house fossils just laying everywhere, but even the team was amazed that they made two in readable finds. They say it a tough expedition in the gobi. Everything has to be transported in including. Large supplies of water. Lots of incredible finds have been found in that region. That one where a complete protoceratops tangled with a velociraptor the two appearently killed each other, way to go proto got that guy back. Also that new dinosaur in lost world Jurassic park the one with the long claws that was a strange one a French expedition found the arms an claws but couldn't find the body. A recent expedition using notes and old photographs found the old dig escavated further and found much more of the creature. Good thing they took pictures that helped them find the original dig. Anyway in the end the Korean archeologist concluded their fossil was of the protoceratops family but a different uncataloged off shoot. How about South America where they been finding those Titano dinosaurs they say it was because South America was covered by a rich dense vegetation but I don't know if I agree like vegetation like that existed all over the world so why wasn't there titanos else where or maybe we just haven't found them yet. Did you watch primeval now that would truly be an archeologist dream.

 

Yeah, bit like Dorset and the Isle of Wight- the Jurassic Coast.
Saw Primeval a lot of years back, but it seemed to lose it's way.