Stone Pages Archaeo News: November 2008 Archives

November 2008 index:

2 November 2008: Ancient stone with phallic motif found in Denmark; A young couple walking along Horsens Fjord (Denmark) in August this year made a sensational discovery – a 5-7,000 year old stone with a carved motif. The 13x10x4 cm limestone...
: Çatalhöyük now protected by a large roof; Çatalhöyük, Turkey's most famous Neolithic site, is one the oldest known areas of human settlement, animal domestication and wheat cultivation. The Culture and Tourism Ministry's Cultural Assets and Museums general...
: Sumatra archeologists find prehistoric stone axes; Archaeologists from North Sumatra found three prehistoric stone axes during an excavation in a land fortress site of Putri Hijau in Namorambe village, Deli Serdang regency. The team consists of...
: Excavation of a 4000-year-old workshop continues at Macau; Archaeologists are planning to return to Macau to excavate up to 3000 square metres on Coloane island following the discovery of a 4000-year-old workshop at the site. Director of the...
: 7000-year-old mound excavated in Iran; Archaeologists were given a second chance by drought to excavate the Mehr-Ali Tappeh at the reservoir of the Mulla Sadra Dam in Fars Province, southern Iran. The 7000-old-year mound and...
: Earliest example of Hebrew writing found on a shard; Five lines of ancient script on a shard of pottery could be the oldest example of Hebrew writing ever discovered, an archaeologist in Israel says. The shard was found by...
: Ancient iceman probably has no modern relatives; Oetzi, Italy's prehistoric iceman, probably does not have any modern day descendants, according to a recent study. A team of Italian and British scientists who sequenced his mitochondrial DNA -...
: Excavations prove İzmir was much older than thought; New excavations have revealed that İzmir (Turkey), once believed to be 5,000 years old, may be as old as 8,500 years. Associate professor Zafer Derin of the Ege University archeology...
: 'Floating ramp' to preserve Welsh hillfort; Vital work has been carried out to prevent erosion damage to a historic hillfort in Wales. As part of a lottery-funded project, footpath improvement and erosion control work has been...
8 November 2008: Bronze Age house unearthed in West Sussex; Traces of a 3,000-year-old later Bronze Age round house have been found on the site of the new Bognor Regis Community College (West Sussex, England). A large extraction pit, containing...
: Bone tool oldest ever found in Indiana; A simple tool carved from a deer's leg bone that college students unearthed in 2003 is more than 10,000 years old, making it the oldest non-stone human artifact ever found...
: St.Louis' last Indian mound is for sale; A house in St.Louis (Missouri, USA) is for sale for $400,000. However, it's what lies beneath the home that excites lovers of St. Louis history, or, in this case, prehistory....
: 12,000 year old grave may have belonged to shaman; The skeleton of a 12,000 year-old Natufian woman has been discovered in northern Israel by archaeologists at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The burial is described as being accompanied by...
: Anger over plans to move ancient Irish stone; A community in Co Galway (Ireland) is outraged that a 2,000-year-old ritual stone is to be moved and taken to a museum. Minister for the Environment John Gormley has been...
: 6,000 km trip to reveal clues to ancient migration; Two Durham University scientists are to play a key part in a 6000km trip following the migration route of ancient Pacific cultures. Drs Keith Dobney and Greger Larson, both from...
: Switzerland to return stolen antiquities to Italy; Switzerland is returning 4,400 ancient artifacts stolen from archaeological sites in Italy, including ceramics, figurines and bronze daggers dating as far back as 2,000 BCE, prosecutors announced. The transfer will...
: Bronze Age village discovered in Romania; A village established in the Bronze Age has been recently discovered near Zalau town, northwestern Romania. The discovery was made following an archeological excavation over a 2 square kilometer area...
: Dig unearths ancient Turkish treasures; Above ground, the Istanbul suburb of Yenikapi is a normal, modern-day bustling port on the Marmaris Sea. But beneath the waters, its newly discovered treasures are rewriting the history books....
: English Heritage Protection Bill could be axed; The English Heritage Protection Bill may not make it into the British Government's parliamentary programme in 2009. Culture minister Andy Burnham has hinted that the draft bill would be excluded...
: Did ancient Scots stop erecting monuments because of a climate change?; Kilmartin Glen, in Argyll, has one of the most important concentrations of Neolithic and Bronze Age remains in Europe. The glen contains at least 350 ancient monuments, many of them...
16 November 2008: Iron Age replica goes up in flames in Wiltshire; A suspicious fire has gutted the replica of a historic hut only two years after it was built. The Iron Age Roundhouse, located just off of the Barbury Castle site...
: Iron Age 'town in the sky' is revealed in Wales; From the air, its hidden tree-covered slopes give little clue to the settlement that existed there 3,000 years ago. But historians have now described an ancient Iron Age hillfort in...
: Neolithic cremation urns found in Istanbul; Construction on the new metro tunnel, which goes under the Bosporus and will connect the Asian and European sides of Istanbul (Turkey), has uncovered 8,000-year-old cremation urns from the Neolithic...
: Huge necropolis discovered in Sicily; Archaeologists working at the ancient Greek city of Himera in northern Sicily (Italy) have uncovered what they now believe to be the largest Greek necropolis on the island. Although experts...
: Ancient village discovered in Arizona; In 2004, voters approved bonds to upgrade and expand the wastewater facility in Tuscon (Arizona, USA). But before anything new can be built, the state and county require a dig for...
: 5,000-year-old relics found in Iran; The recent discovery of 28 relics dating back to 3,000 BCE has shed light on the previous agricultural situation of southern Iran. Archeological excavations in the southern Iranian province of...
: Find in USA nothing more than a fraud; In 1838, excavators of the Grave Creek Mound in West Virginia (USA) made a remarkable discovery: a small stone bearing inscribed markings that were variously read as Celtic, Norse or...
: 2,900 year old Phoenician remains unearthed in Lebanon; Lebanese and Spanish archaeologists have discovered 2,900-year-old earthenware pottery that ancient Phoenicians used to store the bones of their dead after burning the corpses. They said more than 100 jars...
: Archaeologists try to date the Brodgar megaliths on Orkney; The Ring of Brodgar, the third largest standing stone circle in Britain and the Ness of Brodgar, its accompanying settlement site, have been the focus of an investigation funded by...
: Vietnamese cave reveals relics and tombs from the Neolithic; Archaeologists have finished the second phase of excavation at Phia Mun Cave, Na Hang District in the province of Tuyen Quang (Viet Nam) and have uncovered over 1,000 relics and...
: 5 walled cities from 300 BCE unearthed in India; Andhras flourished much before the advent of the Satavahanas, and were said to be as powerful as Mauryans. They had 30 fortified walled cities way back in 300 BCE, wrote...
: The secrets of Knowth; Forty years ago, archaeologist George Eogan became the first person in centuries to see the underground passage tomb at Knowth in Meath (Ireland), part of Brú na Bóinne (Bend of...
23 November 2008: Remains of Iron Age fort found in England; Archaeologists have uncovered what could be the remains of an ancient Iron Age hill fort in the Black Country (West Midlands, England). The exciting find was made during a dig...
: Ancient cemetery discovered in western Iran; A prehistoric burial ground was found near the Iranian city of Sanandaj, located in the country's western Kurdistan Province. The 3,000 year-old cemetery, which was found during a road construction...
: A 7,000-year-old American find awaits analysis; Some 20 years ago, Janet and LeRoy Peterson discovered some of the bones of the giant and now extinct species of bison that Minnesota's first inhabitants hunted and butchered 7,000...
: Ancient monument to the soul unearthed in Turkey; Archaeologists in southeastern Turkey have discovered an Iron Age chiseled stone slab that provides the first written evidence in the region that people believed the soul was separate from the...
: World's most ancient nuclear family discovered in Germany; The oldest genetically identifiable nuclear family met a violent death, according to analysis of remains from 4,600-year-old burials in Germany. Researchers say the broken bones of these stone age people...
: Were Neanderthals stoned to death by modern humans?; Human aerial bombardments might have pushed Neanderthals to extinction, suggests new research. Changes in bone shape left by a life of overhand throwing hint that Stone Age humans regularly threw...
: Did asteroid cause ancient New York tsunami?; Long before New York City was the Big Apple, or even New Amsterdam, a giant tsunami crashed ashore. It was 2,300 years ago. No one knows for sure what caused...
: Greek archaeologists find 6,500-year-old settlement; Archaeologists in central Greece have unearthed the remains of a Neolithic settlement discovered by workers laying a gas pipeline, the Greek Culture Ministry said. The finds include remains of houses...
: Further details on the massive Welsh fort; Cloaked by time's leafy shroud, the prehistoric settlement of Gaer Fawr lies all but invisible beneath a forest in the lush Welsh countryside. Now the 2,900-year-old structure lives again, thanks...
: 3,500-year-old weapon found in a Scottish burn; A Bronze Age spearhead which lay submerged in a burn for 3,500 years has been discovered and handed to a museum. The spearhead was found wedged in a rock crevice...
: Suffolk 'best for buried treasure'; Suffolk and Norfolk are among the best places to find buried treasure in England, a new report has revealed. Hundreds of ancient objects have been unearthed by metal detecting enthusiasts...
: Ancient 'treasures' unearthed in Scotland; A 5,000-year-old axe head, a Bronze Age sword and mysterious carved stone balls form part of Scotland's annual Treasure Trove, items found by archaeologists or enthusiasts which have been handed...
: Amateurs' prehistoric find draws top award; An amateur archaeological team from Datchet (Berkshire, England) have been presented with a Highly Commended award at the British Museum for uncovering a prehistoric settlement at Southlea Farm. For the...
30 November 2008: Grant helps archaeologists dig into archives; Funding from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation will support a project at the University of York (England) to find exciting new ways of making academic research material available online. The...
: Iron Age pottery and flint tools unearthed in Ireland; Archeologists digging at the site of a medieval castle in Co Roscommon (Ireland) found a treasure trove of Iron Age pottery and flint tools that are at least 3,000 years...
: The enigma of Lake Ontario's 11,000-year-old footprints; In the fall of 1908, while building a waterworks tunnel east of Hanlan's Point in Toronto Bay (Canada), a work crew came across 100 footprints in a layer of blue...
: Stone circle moved into a suburban estate; John and Suky Burton imported 13 stones - possibly of prehistoric origin - from their former Weymouth mansion when they downsized to a detached house in Dorchester (Dorset, England). The...
: 5,500-year-old settlement found near Nazca, in Peru; A team of Peruvian and German archaeologists has discovered the remains of a human settlement 5,500 years old near the southern town of Nazca, south of Lima. The archaeologists, who...
: Research sheds light on Ohio's ancient earthworks; High Bank Works is an ancient earthwork built along the Scioto River Valley in Ross County (USA) nearly 2,000 years ago by the Ohio Hopewell culture. It consists of an...
: Ancient pathway found in Vietnamese cave; Traces of a pathway used by ancient people 21,000 years ago have just been discovered at the Xom Trai Cave in the northwestern province of Hoa Binh's Lac Son District...
: Paleolithic Chinese people may have worn red clothing; The color red, which represents luck, happiness and passion in China, could have been used in clothing 15,000 years ago. Li Zhanyang, a researcher with Henan Provincial Institute of Cultural...
: Oldest-ever stash of marijuana found in China; Researchers say they have located the world's oldest stash of marijuana, in a tomb in a remote part of China. The cache of cannabis is about 2,700 years old and...
: Another busy year for archaeology on Orkney; The 2008 summer archaeological season in Orkney was full of activity. Excavations included the continuation of investigations at Stronsay, Wyre, Ness of Brodgar, The Cairns, Notland Links and Skaill Bay...
: Fishermen find ancient boat in Black Sea; A well-preserved wooden dugout canoe - probably dating back to the prehistoric age - has been discovered at the bottom of the Black Sea, scientists said. The vessel was discovered...
: Prehistoric cache found in Minnesota puzzles archaeologists; In the late 1930s, Adolph Schumann was plowing a corn field on his family's Olmsted County (Minnesota, USA) farm when he hit a rock. What he had unearthed looked like...