Science
Archaeology
PREVENTING THE RETURN OF THE DEAD
An archaeological team excavating a necropolis at the site of Sagalassos in southwest Turkey uncovered an unusual and very eerie tomb.
1 min |
September/October 2023
Archaeology
DRAMATIC ENTRANCE
Four miniature terracotta masks found in the Roman city of Jerash in Jordan shed light on its theater district in the second century A.D. Excavators from the University of Jordan unearthed the masks in a doorway of a structure.
1 min |
September/October 2023
Archaeology
PIZZA! PIZZA?
When Pompeian authorities recently unveiled a new wall painting, it launched an international debate.
1 min |
September/October 2023
Archaeology
ROYAL WHARF
During excavations in Oslo's Bjørvika neighborhood, archaeologists have uncovered a portion of the foundations of a medieval wharf.
1 min |
September/October 2023
Archaeology
SUNKEN CARGO
Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) archaeologists have begun to investigate 44 tons of marble building materials that a swimmer spotted in shallow water 600 feet off the coast of the ancient Roman port of Caesarea after they were exposed by a recent storm.
1 min |
September/October 2023
Archaeology
RAM HEADS FOR RAMESSES
While exploring the surroundings of the temple of the pharaoh Ramesses II (reigned ca. 1279-1213 B.C.) in the ancient Egyptian city of Abydos, archaeologists from New York University's Institute for the Study of the Ancient World uncovered an enormous collection of mummified animal heads in an ancient storage area.
1 min |
September/October 2023
Archaeology
THE ELEPHANT AND THE BUDDHA
While working in the village of Gada Balabhadrapur on the banks of the Daya River in India's state of Odisha, archaeologists unearthed a three-foot-tall sculpture of an elephant dating to the third century B.C., a time when Buddhism flourished in the area.
1 min |
September/October 2023
Archaeology
NOSE TO TAIL
Los Angeles' first Chinatown was settled starting around 1880, south of the city's historic center, the Los Angeles Plaza. Over the next two decades, the densely populated neighborhood expanded to the northeast and became home to a range of Chinese-owned businesses. These included markets that sold fare such as plum sauce for seasoning roast meat and restaurants that served up delicacies such as bird's nest soup and century eggs.
3 min |
September/October 2023
Archaeology
An Elegant Enigma
The luxurious possessions of a seventeenth-century woman continue to intrigue researchers a decade after they were retrieved from a shipwreck
7 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
AFRICA'S MERCHANT KINGS
The early Christian kingdom of Aksum was at the heart of a great maritime trading network
10+ min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
DEFENDING THE CANYONLANDS
Rare shields from the American Southwest are a legacy of a turbulent time in Native history
8 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
Inside a Magnificent Celtic Tomb
New investigations of an Iron Age burial in France reveal the source of one woman's exceptional power
10 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
Rise of the Persian Princes
In their grand capital Persepolis, Achaemenid rulers expressed their vision of a prosperous, multicultural empire
10+ min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
OFF THE GRID
One of Mexico's most important archaeological sites is hidden in plain view in the Tlalpan borough of southern Mexico City.
2 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
BIG GAME HUNTING
Archaeologists rarely unearth the remains of large predators such as leopards, lions, and bears. But University of Haifa archaeologist Ron Shimelmitz and his colleagues wondered if, by looking at a large number of sites over thousands of years, they could identify evidence showing that ancient people hunted these fearsome creatures.
1 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
HYBRID HOARD
A hoard of silver and gold items buried in the Netherlands 800 years ago-possibly for safekeeping during a time of war-was recovered by a licensed metal detectorist.
1 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
BULLISH ON THE STORM GOD
In southern Turkey's Amuq Valley, a curious one-inch-tall lead figurine unearthed at a rural Bronze Age site is giving archaeologists a glimpse of how villagers living around 2000 B.C. responded to a period marked by increasing drought.
1 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
A SURPRISE IN SUDAN
Beneath the ruins of the medieval village of Old Dongola, on the Nile in northern Sudan, a team from the University of Warsaw was surprised to find stone blocks that may date to the time of the pharaoh Taharqo (reigned ca.690-664 B.C.).
1 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
THE PALACE ON TABLET HILL
At the site of the ancient Sumerian city of Girsu A in present-day Tello, in southern Iraq, In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, French archaeologists excavated tens of thousands of cuneiform tablets there.
1 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
VIKING SUPPORT ANIMALS
The warriors of the Viking Great Army who campaigned in Britain from A.D. 865 to 878 worshipped gods often associated with animal companions, such as Odin and his eight-legged horse Sleipnir.
1 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
UPDATE - TEMPLE TIMES TWO
A team led by archaeologist Jessica Ortiz Zevallos has returned to the Temple of the Painted Pillars at the site of Pañamarca in northwestern Peru, where they have discovered new well-preserved, brightly colored paintings.
1 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
BOG TOGS
A piece of fabric found in a Highland peat bog in the early 1980s has now been determined to be the oldest example of true tartan ever located in Scotland.
1 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
A NEW DAY FOR THE ANCESTORS' MOUNDS
In fall 2007, Glenna Wallace, chief of the Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma, visited the Octagon Earthworks in the central Ohio city of Newark while attending a lecture series at the Ohio State University in nearby Columbus.
3 min |
July/August 2023
Archaeology
LETTER FROM THE AMERICAN SOUTHEAST SPARTANS OF THE LOWER MISSISSIPPI
Unearthing evidence of defiance and resilience in the homeland of the Chickasaw
10+ min |
May/June 2023
Archaeology
The Man in the Middle
How an ingenious royal official transformed Persian conquerors into proper Egyptian pharaohs
10+ min |
May/June 2023
Archaeology
Rituals of the Cattle Raiders
Rock art in the mountains of South Africa tells the story of how the Khoe and San peoples resisted enslavement
7 min |
May/June 2023
Archaeology
Peru's Great Urban Experiment
A millennium ago, the Chimú built a new way of life in the vast city of Chan Chan
10+ min |
May/June 2023
Archaeology
REUSING THE PAST
Archaeologists discover how an embattled Assyrian king fortified Nineveh
3 min |
May/June 2023
Archaeology
LOST ROMAN RESORT
In the Bay of Naples, miles of ruins recall the splendor of ancient imperial holidays
10+ min |
May/June 2023
Archaeology
AROUND THE WORLD
Researchers determined that a mastodon living in the Pacific Northwest 13,900 years ago was wounded when it was struck by a spear.
3 min |