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Archaeology news
Rabana-Merquly: Was the mountain fortress also a Parthian-era sanctuary?
Besides being a fortress for military use, the ancient mountain settlement of Rabana-Merquly in modern Iraqi Kurdistan could have also been a 'sanctuary' dedicated to the ancient Persian water goddess Anahita. Architectural ...
Archaeology
1 hour ago
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Tracing the spread of cacao domestication
The cacao tree (Theobroma cacao), whose beans (cocoa) are used to make products including chocolate, liquor and cocoa butter, may have spread from the Amazon basin to the other regions of South and Central America at least ...
Archaeology
6 hours ago
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Lost tombs and quarries rediscovered on British military base in Cyprus
More than forty archaeological sites in Cyprus dating potentially as far back as the Bronze Age that were thought lost to history have been relocated by University of Leicester scientists working for the Ministry of Defence.
Archaeology
Mar 6, 2024
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Ancient stone tools found in Ukraine date to over 1 million years ago, and may be oldest in Europe
Ancient stone tools found in western Ukraine may be the oldest known evidence of early human presence in Europe, according to research published Wednesday in the journal Nature.
Archaeology
Mar 6, 2024
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Archaeologists uncover the heritage of a marginalized community
Archaeologists have excavated the former working-class neighborhood of Vaakunakylä near Oulu, west-central Finland and interviewed its previous inhabitants, revealing the rich heritage of this marginalized community.
Archaeology
Mar 5, 2024
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Ancient Mesoamericans may have drunk tobacco in healing rituals, reveal archaeologists
Archaeologists have analyzed chemical residues from ceramic vases at the city of Cotzumalhuapa, Guatemala, revealing physical evidence of tobacco use in Mesoamerica, likely for ritual and therapeutic purposes.
Archaeology
Mar 5, 2024
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Archaeologists unearth abandoned townsite at Washington on The Brazos
A short walk from the banks of the Brazos River in Washington County, members of a small crew dressed in sun hats and gardening gloves push buckets of mud through metal sieves, picking out nails, bits of glass and ceramic, ...
Archaeology
Mar 5, 2024
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New timeline for East Asian hominins' tool-making revealed
A new study from the Nihewan basin of China has revealed that hominins who possessed advanced knapping abilities equivalent to Mode 2 technological features occupied East Asia as early as 1.1 million years ago (Ma), which ...
Archaeology
Mar 5, 2024
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Rare eleventh-century astrolabe discovery reveals Islamic–Jewish scientific exchange
The identification of an eleventh-century Islamic astrolabe bearing both Arabic and Hebrew inscriptions makes it one of the oldest examples ever discovered and one of only a handful known in the world. The astronomical instrument ...
Archaeology
Mar 3, 2024
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The tools in a medieval Japanese healer's toolkit: From fortunetelling and exorcism to herbal medicines
"The Tale of Genji," often called Japan's first novel, was written 1,000 years ago. Yet it still occupies a powerful place in the Japanese imagination. A popular TV drama, "Dear Radiance"—"Hikaru kimi e"—is based on the ...
Archaeology
Mar 1, 2024
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Seeing the wood for the trees: How archaeologists use hazelnuts to reconstruct ancient woodlands
If we could stand in a landscape that our Mesolithic ancestors called home, what would we see around us? Scientists have devised a method of analyzing preserved hazelnut shells to tell us whether the microhabitats around ...
Archaeology
Feb 29, 2024
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Researchers create method to detect cases of anemia in archaeological remains
Diagnosing anemia in living people is typically a matter of a routine blood test. Retrospectively diagnosing anemia in people who died decades or even centuries ago is much more challenging since there is no blood left to ...
Archaeology
Feb 28, 2024
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Who owns prehistory? How debate over fossils in China shaped the relationship between science and sovereignty
Many museums and other cultural institutions in the West have faced, in recent years, demands for artistic repatriation. The Elgin Marbles, currently housed in the British Museum, are perhaps the most prominent subject of ...
Archaeology
Feb 28, 2024
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Climate change threatens thousands of archaeological sites in coastal Georgia
Thousands of historic and archaeological sites in Georgia are at risk from tropical storm surges, and that number will increase with climate change, according to a study published in PLOS ONE by Matthew D. Howland and Victor ...
Archaeology
Feb 28, 2024
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Experiment captures why pottery forms are culturally distinct
Potters of different cultural backgrounds learn new types differently, producing cultural differences even in the absence of differential cultural evolution. Kobe University-led research, published in PNAS Nexus, has implications ...
Archaeology
Feb 28, 2024
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Genetic study suggests a Stone Age strategy for avoiding inbreeding
Blood relations and kinship were not all-important for the way hunter-gatherer communities lived during the Stone Age in Western Europe. A new genetic study, conducted at several well-known French Stone Age burial sites, ...
Archaeology
Feb 28, 2024
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First DNA study of ancient Eastern Arabians reveals malaria adaptation
People living in ancient Eastern Arabia appear to have developed resistance to malaria following the appearance of agriculture in the region around five thousand years ago, a new study reveals.
Archaeology
Feb 27, 2024
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A physical model to quantify the quality of stones selected as tools by Stone Age hunter–gatherers
Early hunter–gatherers from the Middle Stone Age in southern Africa were selecting the most suitable material available for stone tools and spearheads more than 60,000 years ago, according to a study by Dr. Patrick Schmidt ...
Archaeology
Feb 27, 2024
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Solving the 120-year maritime mystery of the SS Nemesis
A CSIRO team aboard research vessel (RV) Investigator has helped Heritage NSW solve a 120-year mystery with the discovery of the SS Nemesis, a 73-meter iron-hulled steamship that was lost at sea in 1904.
Archaeology
Feb 26, 2024
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Plant seed and fruit analysis from the biblical home of Goliath sheds unprecedented light on Philistine ritual practices
The enigmatic Philistine culture, which flourished during the Iron Age (ca. 1200–604 BCE), profoundly affected the southern Levant's cultural history, agronomy, and dietary customs. More than a quarter century of excavations ...
Archaeology
Feb 26, 2024
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