News Round Up

CAMBRIDGE, ENGLAND—According to a report in The Independent, a genetic study of remains recovered from a Crusader-era mass burial pit in what is now Lebanon indicates that even though some of the fighters were descendants of Western Europeans and…

ROCK HILL, SOUTH CAROLINA—According to a Science Magazine report, a large figurine workshop dated to between A.D. 750 and 900 was discovered in the highlands of Guatemala during a construction project on private property. Archaeologist Brent…

WEST SUSSEX, ENGLAND—The Guardian reports that zooarchaeologist Fay Worley of Historic England spotted a small fragment of a rabbit’s tibia bone in a box of artifacts that were unearthed in 1964 at Fishbourne Palace in southeast England. This was…

GUANGZHOU, CHINA—Xinhua reports that a 13,500-year-old tomb at the site of the Qingtang ruins in southeastern China has yielded the remains of a young woman who died between the ages of 13 and 18 and was buried, without her head, in a squatting…

NEW YORK, NEW YORK—According to a report in The Atlantic, Jordan Abell of Columbia University and his colleagues were able to detect a possible shift from hunting and gathering to herding at the site of Aşıklı Höyük, in Turkey’s central Anatolia…

Christopher Tripp takes readers on a tour of Thurrock’s past, from the Palaeolithic (tools having been found at Purfleet, for example) to the Saxon period (Mucking being the stand-out site in this period). In between, there is the Iron Age enclosed…

When does an object become an artefact? Is an artefact always an artefact? How do artefacts relate to human evolution? How do artefacts themselves evolve? These are some of the questions posed by Michael Chazan in this thought-provoking book. The…

When we think about Victorian childhood, we probably conjure up images of ragged Dickensian street urchins, strict educations, and children seen and not heard. As we might expect, though – and as demonstrated in this book – the reality was far more…

It is little surprise that geology initially evolved as a British science, for within a set of smallish islands the British Isles have been blessed by an almost unseemly range of rocks of all ages. Beneath our green and pleasant land sits a varied…

This is a teaching resource published by Forestry and Land Scotland. Aimed at students of later primary school age (that is, 8- to 12-year-olds), it teaches them about the Neolithic way of life. It follows on from Forestry Commission Scotland’s…

Alasdair Whittle’s most recent contribution to this fascinating period in European prehistory argues cogently against the concept of wholesale change at a particular point in time. As for all prehistoric archaeology spatial and temporal development…

Bolton Museum recently opened its new-look Egyptian galleries to the public. Lucia Marchini paid a visit to find out more about the collection. The post Review – Bolton’s Egypt appeared first on Current Archaeology.

BAGICZ, POLAND—According to a Science in Poland report, scientists from the University of Szczecin and the University of Warsaw examined the remains of a woman that eroded out of a cliff in northwestern Poland in the late nineteenth century.…

UPPSALA, SWEDEN—Paleogenomicist Federico Sánchez-Quinto of Uppsala University and his colleagues suggest European megalithic societies may have invested social power in male family lines across multiple generations, according to a Science Magazine…

RIMAVSKÁ SOBOTA, SLOVAKIA—The Slovak Spectator reports that 17 graves containing cremated human remains were discovered during archaeological investigation ahead of a construction project in the town of Rimavská Sobota, in southern Slovakia.…

OXFORD, ENGLAND—BBC News reports that 26 skeletons have been uncovered in southern England during excavation work for a new water pipeline. The oldest burials are nearly 3,000 years old and may be associated with the people who built monumental…

EUREKA SPRINGS, ARKANSAS—The Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reports that more than 400 glass bottles were uncovered in what may have been a root cellar located behind a building that housed the Baker Hospital and Health Resort over a period of…

LONDON, ENGLAND—According to an Associated Press report, a genetic study of human remains dating to as early as 8500 B.C. indicates that early farmers from the region around the Aegean Sea arrived in Britain some 6,000 years ago and replaced the…

EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND—According to a report in The Guardian, scientists have reconstructed the face of a dog that lived on Mainland, the largest of the Orkney Islands, some 4,500 years ago. Unearthed in 1901, its skull was one of 24 dog skulls that…

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL—According to a report in The Rio Times, more than 30,000 artifacts, including items such as plates, cutlery, clothing, and uniforms bearing the imperial insignia, were recovered during work to renovate the Zoological Garden of…