A discovery made in the cave of La Garma (Cantabria, north of Spain) has shed new light on the hunting techniques used by our ancestors over 16,000 years ago. An international team of researchers, led by Dr. Marián Cueto from the Autonomous University of Barcelona, has recently published a study detailing the discovery of a […]
Posted inStone Age Archaeology
Megalithic Structures Are Not Mass Graves of Plague Victims from a Neolithic Outbreak
When we think of deadly pandemics, the plague often comes to mind, especially because of the devastation it caused during the Middle Ages. However, new research has revealed that the plague-causing bacterium, Yersinia pestis, has existed in Central and Northern Europe for more than 5,000 years. Scientists have wondered if this bacterium, even in its […]
Posted inClassical Archaeology
How Much Did It Cost to Transport Goods in the Roman World? A Study Focused on Britain Reveals That Maritime Routes Were the Cheapest
A study recently published in the Journal of Archaeological Science has analyzed the relative costs of transporting goods by different means in late Roman Britain, challenging some long-held notions about the economy of the Roman Empire. The research team, led by Rob Wiseman from the University of Cambridge, has developed a novel method for calculating […]
Posted inModern Era
Juggernaut, the origin of the word that defines a destructive, uncontrollable, and unstoppable force
To define the plague that devastates the world in her novel The Last Man, Mary Shelley (also the author of Frankenstein) writes: Like Juggernaut, it proceeds crushing the being of all who stand in the high road of life. The term Juggernaut is also used by Robert Louis Stevenson in The Strange Case of Dr. […]
Posted inScience
Astronomers Find Most of the Universe is Darkness, and Its Light Has Been Fading for 10 Billion Years
Scientists have taken a virtual trip to the far reaches of our solar system to measure the faint glow that fills the universe, called the cosmic optical background. This glow is the dim light left behind by stars and galaxies that have formed and burned out since the beginning of the cosmos. The study, published […]
Posted inArchaeology
Quarters, Warehouses, Weapons, and a Bronze Sword of Ramesses II Discovered in the Fort That Protected Northern Egypt from the Sea Peoples
An Egyptian archaeological mission, led by Dr. Ahmed Said El-Kharadly of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, has discovered a series of mudbrick architectural units, including military barracks for soldiers and storage rooms for weapons, food, and provisions from the New Kingdom era. These findings were made during ongoing excavations at the site of Tell Al-Abqain, […]
Posted inArchaeology
9 Patolli Boards, an Ancient Mesoamerican Game Played with Beans, Found in Mexico
During the archaeological rescue efforts led by the federal Ministry of Culture, through the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), nine patolli engravings were discovered along Section 7 of the Maya Train. These patollis, which are an ancient Mesoamerican game, were found on the free road to Chetumal, in a structure identified as T7-44279, […]
Posted inBronze Age Archaeology
The Lost Shipyards of the Nordic Bronze Age, an Enigma Hidden in Plain Sight
The Nordic Bronze Age, marked by its iconic imagery of ships carved into rocks and metal objects scattered throughout Scandinavia, has always left an unsolved enigma for archaeologists: where were these ships built? Despite the abundance of ship representations in the region’s archaeology, direct evidence of prehistoric shipyards has been extremely scarce. Now a new […]
Posted inScience
Argo Navis, the Ancient Constellation So Large It Had to Be Divided Into Three
In the depths of the southern sky, where the stars appear brighter and more numerous, there once existed a constellation so vast and majestic that modern astronomers were forced to divide it. In ancient times, sailors would look up to a sky studded with stars, identifying patterns that helped them navigate both the seas and […]
Posted inStone Age Archaeology
An ancient prehistoric bridge submerged in a cave in Mallorca reveals that humans arrived there 1,000 years earlier than previously thought
A recent study led by an interdisciplinary team of researchers from the University of South Florida and the University of New Mexico has revealed that humans arrived on the Mediterranean island of Mallorca about 5,600 years ago. This finding, based on the dating of an ancient submerged bridge in a cave on the island, suggests […]