Archaeology News

July 8, 2016

Fire Discovery Sheds Light On 'Hobbit' Demise

Ancient 'Deep Skull' Full of Surprises

Early Adoption of Poison-Tipped Arrows in Africa

'Hobbit' Likely a Fossil Human Species

Latest Headlines

updated 4:58am EDT

No One Is an Island: The History of Human Genetic Ancestry in Madagascar

July 5, 2016 — To get at the heart of Malagasy genetic ancestry and reconstruct their history, a researcher team investigated genome-wide genotyping data of Malagasy populations along with ... read more

Exploring the Prehistory of Palawan Island Through Human Remains

June 24, 2016 — Researchers are excavating human remains from caves in Palawan Island in the Philippines to learn more about the diversity of burial and other cultural practices over the ... read more

Ancient DNA Shows Perfect Storm Felled Ice Age Giants

June 17, 2016 — Giant Ice Age species including elephant-sized sloths and powerful sabre-toothed cats that once roamed the windswept plains of Patagonia, southern South America, were finally ... read more

Old World Metals Traded on Alaska Coast Hundreds of Years Before Contact With Europeans

June 8, 2016 — Two leaded bronze artifacts found in northwestern Alaska are the first evidence that metal from Asia reached prehistoric ... read more

Single Strain of Plague Bacteria Sparked Multiple Historical and Modern Pandemics

June 8, 2016 — A single entry of the plague bacterium into Europe was responsible for the Black Plague of the mid-14th century. This same ... read more

'Pristine' Landscapes Haven't Existed for Thousands of Years Due to Human Activity

June 6, 2016 — 'Pristine' landscapes simply do not exist anywhere in the world today and, in most cases, have not existed for at least ... read more

Early Farmers from Across Europe Were Direct Descendants of Aegeans

June 6, 2016 — Paleogeneticists have shown that early farmers from across Europe have an almost unbroken trail of ancestry leading back to ... read more

Research Proves Aboriginal Australians Were First Inhabitants

June 6, 2016 — Researchers have found evidence that demonstrates Aboriginal people were the first to inhabit Australia.The work refutes an earlier landmark study that claimed to recover DNA ... read more

Lucy Had Neighbors: A Review of African Fossils

June 6, 2016 — If 'Lucy' wasn't alone, who else was in her neighborhood? Key fossil discoveries over the last few decades in Africa indicate that multiple early human ancestor species lived ... read more

Neanderthals Used Fire in Caves: French Cave Sheds New Light on the Neanderthals

June 1, 2016 — Deep inside Bruniquel Cave, in the Tarn et Garonne region of southwestern France, a set of human-made structures 336 meters ... read more

Last Words: Language of China's Emperors in Peril

Stolen Ancient Sculpture Returns to Italy

Archaeologists in Israel Race to Find Ancient Scrolls

Using New Technology to Scan Ancient Pyramids

Fossil Teeth Suggest Prehistoric Red Deer in the Adriatic Migrated Seasonally

June 8, 2016 — Analysis of oxygen isotopes in fossil teeth from red deer near the Adriatic Sea suggest that they migrated seasonally, which may have driven the movements of the Paleolithic hunter-gatherers that ate ... read more

Back to the Future: Space-Age Exploration for Pre-Historic Bones

May 31, 2016 — Scientists roped in the use of high-tech laser scanning, photogrammetry and 3-D mapping technology to map Homo naledi's Dinaledi ... read more

Remains of Rice and Mung Beans Help Solve a Madagascan Mystery

May 30, 2016 — Researchers have helped discover why the inhabitants of Madagascar speak Malagasy, a language otherwise unique to Southeast Asia and the Pacific -- a region located at least 6,000 km away. An ... read more

Genomic Study Tracks African-American Dispersal in the Great Migration

May 27, 2016 — An assessment of genomic diversity in the United States of America clarifies the role of pre-Civil War admixture and early 20th century transit routes in shaping the migration history and genomic ... read more

Migration Back to Africa Took Place During the Palaeolithic

May 26, 2016 — A research group has managed to retrieve the mitochondrial genome of a fossil 35,000 years old found in the Pestera Muierii cave in Romania. That woman was part of the first population of our species ... read more

High Altitude Archaeology: Prehistoric Paintings Revealed

May 25, 2016 — Archaeologists have undertaken pioneering scans of the highest prehistoric paintings of animals in ... read more

Ancient DNA Study Finds Phoenician from Carthage Had European Ancestry

May 25, 2016 — A research team has sequenced the first complete mitochondrial genome of a 2,500-year-old Phoenician dubbed the 'Young Man of Byrsa' or 'Ariche.' This is the first ancient DNA to ... read more

New Research Maps in Unique Detail the Devastation of the Black Death on Medieval England

May 23, 2016 — An innovative new archaeological study has revealed in detail for the first time how individual towns, villages and hamlets across swathes of medieval England were decimated by the Black ... read more

How Plants Conquered the Land

May 19, 2016 — A key gene has been found that assisted the transition of plants from water to the land around 500 million years ago. The ANR gene is required to tolerate 'extreme dehydration' in the moss ... read more

Burial Sites Show How Nubians, Egyptians Integrated Communities Thousands of Years Ago

May 18, 2016 — New bioarchaeological evidence shows that Nubians and Egyptians integrated into a community, and even married, in ancient Sudan, according to new research from an ... read more

Ancient Irish Musical History Found in Modern India

May 13, 2016 — An archaeologist studying musical horns from iron-age Ireland has found musical traditions, thought to be long dead, are alive and well in south India.The realization that modern Indian horns are ... read more

Student Deciphers 'Cave Art': 'Stone Age Art' in Upper Franconian Cave Not an Archaeological Sensation After All

May 12, 2016 — The Mäanderhöhle cave near Bamberg was previously regarded as an archaeological sensation. It was thought to contain some of the oldest cave art in Germany. However, a researcher has demonstrated ... read more

Archaeologists Uncover 13,000-Year-Old Bones of Ancient, Extinct Species of Bison at Old Vero Man Site

May 11, 2016 — In what is considered one of the oldest and most important archaeological digs in North America, scientists have uncovered what they believe are the bones of a 13,000- to 14,000-year-old ancient, ... read more

New Archaeological Method Finds Children Were Skilled Ceramists During the Bronze Age

May 11, 2016 — Artisanal interpretation of ceramics from the Bronze Age shows that a nine-year-old child could be a highly skilled artisan. This was one of the discoveries presented in a new thesis that explores ... read more

Humans Were in Southern Arabia 10,000 Years Earlier Than First Thought

May 11, 2016 — The last Ice Age made much of the globe uninhabitable, but there were oases -- or refugia -- where people 20,000 years ago were able to cluster and survive. Researchers who specialize in the ... read more

Simulation of Prehistoric Population Dynamics Using Current Topographical Satellite Data

May 5, 2016 — An accurate method to simulate prehistoric movements of people based upon current topographical satellite data may prove useful in determining early human population dynamics even when no genetic ... read more

Underwater Archaeology Looks at Atomic Relic of the Cold War

Apr. 28, 2016 — New research focuses on a single shipwreck as the lens through which maritime archaeology assesses the advent of the Atomic Age and the Cold War. The wreck is the World War II veteran aircraft ... read more

Early Humans May Have Been Food for Carnivores 500,000 Years Ago

Apr. 27, 2016 — Tooth-marks on a 500,000-year-old hominin femur bone found in a Moroccan cave indicate that it was consumed by large carnivores, likely hyenas, according to a new ... read more

Novel Collagen Fingerprinting Identifies a Neanderthal Bone Among 2,000 Fragments

Apr. 22, 2016 — Scientists have used a new molecular fingerprinting technique to identify one Neanderthal bone from around 2,000 bone fragments. All the tiny pieces of bone were recovered from a key archaeological ... read more

Iron Age Man Was as Fond of Swiss Cheese as We Are

Apr. 21, 2016 — Archaeologists have uncovered evidence that Swiss cheesemaking dates back to prehistoric times, paving the way for such delicacies as Gruyere and ... read more

Wednesday, June 8, 2016