Archaeology

Easter Island Mystery: What Really Happened To Rapa Nui Society?

In 1722, when Europeans arrived on Easter Island, nearly 2,300 miles off the west coast of Chile, the native Polynesian culture known as Rapa Nui were already in a demographic tailspin from which they would not recover. Pick a fad belief of the moment, and ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 27 2015 - 5:02pm

Valentine's Day 6,000 BC: Phallic Carvings And Sex Cults

We tend to think society is more sexualized today but perhaps it's only now that the common people are getting it on the way elites once did. In the Eilat Mountain region around Nahal Roded in Israel, recently discovered sites look distinct from other ...

Blog Post - Hank Campbell - Jan 31 2019 - 6:54pm

Richard III's Scoliosis Might Not Have Been Known To The Public

In the most famous versions of Richard III, written by William Shakespeare, the last Plantagenet king was physically and mentally deformed.  But the public probably did not know what, and if they did, they wisely never mentioned it. A king busy fighting t ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 15 2015 - 8:24pm

Optimized: There Was Nothing Natural About Ancient Clam Beaches And Indigenous People

It's a First World Idyll that ancient indigenous people sustained themselves using nature's bounty, in harmony with the land. Science knows otherwise. Instead, from Alaska to Washington, indigenous people created productive clam gardens to ensur ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 29 2015 - 11:39am

Egtved Girl: The Life Story Of A Bronze Age Female

A detailed analysis of the remains of a high-status Danish Bronze Age female, known as the Egtved Girl, has revealed information about her movements, what she ate, and where her clothes came from. The Egtved Girl, a 16–18 year old female, was discovered in ...

Article - News Staff - May 21 2015 - 6:00am

Cradle Of Manufacturing? World's Oldest Stone Tools Discovered In Kenya

Scientists have found stone tools dating back 3.3 million years, long before the advent of modern humans, and by far the oldest such artifacts yet discovered. The tools, whose makers may or may not have been some sort of human ancestor, push the known date ...

Article - News Staff - May 20 2015 - 1:06pm

Photogrammetry: Of Viking Graves And Sunken Ships

Mapping archaeological digs used to take plenty of time and a lot of measuring, photographing, drawing and note taking, much of which can now be done with a technique called photogrammetry. Photogrammetry is a method that uses two-dimensional images of an ...

Article - News Staff - May 22 2015 - 12:39pm

Mummy Madness In The Anatomical Record- All Open Access

If you like mummies (and who doesn't like mummies?) you are in luck: The Anatomical Record has a special issue with 26 articles devoted to them, all open access. You may not leave the house this weekend. ...

Article - Hank Campbell - May 23 2015 - 10:17am

Did The Scottish Settle Iceland A Century Before The Norse?

Remarkably similar carvings and simple cross sculptures mark special sites or places once sacred, spanning a zone stretching from the Irish and Scottish coasts to Iceland. We can look to Skellig Michael, which rises from the sea 12 kilometers off the sout ...

Article - The Conversation - May 25 2015 - 7:30am

Prehistoric Gold Trade Route Discovered

Archaeologists have found evidence of an ancient gold trade route between the south-west of the UK and Ireland, which would mean people were trading gold between the two countries as far back as the early Bronze Age, 2500 B.C. The finding was made after me ...

Article - News Staff - Jun 6 2015 - 12:00pm