Archaeology (Page 7)

The latest digs, ideas, and discoveries about our past, from ancient cities to our prehistoric ancestors.

Latest in Archaeology

A possible painting of the dicynodont made by the San in the early 1800s.

The perplexing puzzle of a ‘Horned Serpent’ cave painting

Skeletal remains of child buried in vampire grave

Medieval child ‘vampire burial’ exhumed near Polish cathedral

a long bronze sword

Egyptologists find ancient sword possibly wielded against the mysterious ‘Sea Peoples’

By Laura Baisas

neanderthal teeth in a cave

Neanderthals’ social isolation may have sped up their extinction

By Laura Baisas

Lasius emarginatus

This immigrant ant is taking New York City by storm

By Popular Science Team

Titanic bow wreckage underwater

The famous railing from ‘Titanic’ has broken off from Titanic

Various artifacts recovered from Temple of Buto

Egyptologists uncover 2,500 year-old observatory full of precise tools

X-ray of skull pointing to region with evidence of cocaine use

Mummified brains show cocaine arrived in Europe far earlier than we thought

Mastodon skull in Iowa creek bed

Huge mastodon skull found in a rural Iowa creek

several sharp clovis points of varying size

Ice Age humans may have used pikes to hunt mammoths

By Laura Baisas

seven circular pieces of silver dating back to the viking age

Metal detector enthusiast finds Viking silver in a field

By Laura Baisas

a large, domed rock formation

Geologists find solid evidence of ancient ‘snowball Earth’

By Laura Baisas

An old ink drawing of Sweden’s Forsa Ring with the runic inscription.

Even Vikings had to pay fines

By Laura Baisas

stonehenge. these large neolithic standing stones are arranged in a circle

Geologists crack a major Stonehenge mystery

By Laura Baisas

In Scandinavia, early people adorned rocks with thousands of images of boats.

Scandinavia’s missing Bronze-Age boatyards

By Richard Kemeny / Hakai Magazine

A sample location from the Sampling Quadrangle Assemblages Research Experiment (SQuARE), Square 03 in the starboard Maintenance Work Area of the International Space Station. An open crew berth is visible at right. The yellow dotted line indicates the boundaries of the sample area.

Astronauts conduct the first archeological study in space

human bones belonging to an small, extinct, early human secies

New ‘Hobbit’ fossils discovered on Indonesia’s Flores island

By Laura Baisas

Pyramid of Djoser with camel

Egypt’s oldest pyramid may have been built using a hydraulic lift

two ancient gold coins with the image of an archer carved into them

Archeologists uncover hoard of gold coins linked to ancient mercenaries

By Laura Baisas

Close up of Screaming Woman mummy's face

‘Screaming woman’ may solve a 3,500-year-old mummy mystery

various bird bones out on a table

Neanderthals ate birds. But how?

By Laura Baisas

plaster cast of human remains in Pompeii

Two Pompeii skeletons reveal a new story of death at mega disaster

By Laura Baisas

a 3D rendering of three early humans butchering a giant armadillo

Early humans butchered enormous armadillos

By Laura Baisas

several stone circles marking gravesites in a field in norway

Stone circles unearthed in Norway mark ancient children’s graves

By Laura Baisas

Located in the foothills of a rock emerging from a green field

Iron Age plant remains tell new agricultural story in east Africa

By Laura Baisas

cone shaped skull

These viking ladies tried to start a trend for pointy heads, but it didn’t take off

By Popular Science Team

Breakdown of Antikythera mechanism

The world’s oldest mechanical computer used a lunar calendar to study the stars

Ritual sticks uncovered in Cloggs Cave date back 10,000 to 12,000 years.

Evidence of 12,000-year-old cultural ritual unearthed in Australia

By Laura Baisas

five statues depicting the high dignitary Nefer and his wife (Abusir, Egypt).

Ancient Egyptian scribes suffered bone damage from working long hours in hunched positions

By Laura Baisas

the wreckage of an ancient greek shipwreck underwater, with two divers exploring it

Nuts, bones, and wood help date a 2,000-year-old Greek shipwreck

By Laura Baisas

eight catapult stones on grass

Archeologists uncover 800-year-old stone catapult shots used in English Civil War

By Laura Baisas

The ancient oak circle which emerged from the shifting sands at Holme next the Sea in Norfolk. The ring of oak tree trunks with a large upturned tree at its centre is believed to be 4,000 years old & is said to be of great archaeological importance.

What is ‘Seahenge’? Bronze Age worshipers may have used the structure to try to extend the summer

By Laura Baisas

The world’s oldest wine contains a cremated Roman aristocrat

Bronze Age ruins on the Greek island Aegina, surrounded by sparkling blue waters and mountains

Ancient, surprisingly well-preserved purple dye uncovered in Greece

By Laura Baisas

Detail from the reconstructed stone tzompantli, or skull rack, at Chichén Itzá.

Ancient Mayan human sacrifices involved twins

Five mysterious ancient artifacts that still puzzle archaeologists

Five mysterious ancient artifacts that still puzzle archaeologists

By Natasha Harlow / The Conversation

yaks and sheep grazing on grassland with mountains in the distance

Bronze Age nomads used cauldrons for blood sausage and yak milk

By Laura Baisas

Visualisation of the central grave/main burial of the Grafenbühl mound

DNA suggests ancient Celtic royalty was matrilineal

steam rising over blue water in a pool built by ancient romans

What Britain’s famed Roman Baths could teach us about microbes

By Laura Baisas

a human skull on a dark background with E270 printed on it

4,000 year-old Egyptian skulls show attempts at brain surgery to treat cancer

By Laura Baisas

The Red Pyramid at the Dahshur necropolis, constructed during the Fourth Dynasty.

Long-lost Nile branch may explain landlocked pyramids

Assyrian mural image of lion

Ancient mystery code was probably Sargon II’s name

a hollow 12-sided object with knobs on each face on display at a musuem.

Ancient, mysterious 12-sided object still baffles archeologists

By Laura Baisas

a ring affixed to a wall in the ancient Mayan city of Chichen Itza

Plants detected in ancient Mayan ‘ballcourts’ point to a sacred spot

By Laura Baisas

Statue of Plato in Greece

A ‘bionic eye’ scan of an ancient, scorched scroll points to Plato’s long-lost gravesite

a handwritten letter to ruth mallory from george mallory before he died on mount everest

Read the last letters by George Mallory, who died exploring Mt. Everest in 1924

By Laura Baisas

Anterior trunk vertebrae of Vasuki indicus.

Enormous snake in ancient India was longer than a school bus

By Lauren Leffer

several grey and brown coins dating back from 650 to 670 CE

Lasers provide clues to an early medieval money mystery

By Laura Baisas

three baby chickens standing in a nest with open and unopened eggshells

Why chickens probably crossed the Silk Road

By Laura Baisas

Sir Ernest Shackleton's ship the Nimrod, among the ice in McMurdo's Sound, Antarctica.

Cracking open a 117-year-old Antarctic milk time capsule

By Laura Baisas

the facial reconstruction of Emperor Wu, an ancient Chinese ruler of the Northern Zhou dynasty. he has dark hair, tan skin.

Scientists recreate the face of an ancient Chinese emperor

By Laura Baisas

a prehistoric tooth in a lab

Rare traces of tooth decay and gum disease found in Bronze Age teeth

By Laura Baisas

An illustration of the Bronze Age stilt settlement uncovered at Must Farm in eastern England. Five circular dwellings stand above a boggy wetland.

Bronze Age village was ‘pretty cozy’—until Britain’s Pompeii

By Laura Baisas

human remains uncovered in Sweden.

Kissing and eating during the Stone Age ‘could be lethal’

By Laura Baisas

Ancient Greece’s biggest port is older than we thought

Ancient Greece’s biggest port is older than we thought

By J. Besl/Hakai Magazine

Sun rises over tall sand dunes. The Erg Chebbi region of the Sahara desert in Morocco. The region is home to the 984 foot tall Lala Lallia star dune.

The mysterious ‘star dune’ in the Sahara is on the move

By Laura Baisas

Shelled and unshelled hazlenuts on a wooden table.

Humans have been eating hazelnuts for at least 6,000 years

By Laura Baisas

The stone tool was glued into a handle with an adhesive that is made of liquid bitumen, with the addition of 55 percent ochre. It is no longer sticky and can be handled easily.

Neanderthals likely used glue to make tools

By Laura Baisas

The skeletal remains of a frog and a human were uncovered at Seminario Vescovile in Verona, Italy.

Iron Age humans found mysteriously buried with dogs and horses

By Laura Baisas

A 3D model of a section of the Blinkerwall next to a large boulder at the western end of the wall.

Europe’s oldest human-made megastructure may be at the bottom of the Baltic Sea

By Laura Baisas

The wheel of the Arlington, about 600 feet underwater.

Shipwreck hunters find WWII-era ship in Lake Superior

By Laura Baisas

2,000 new characters from burnt-up ancient Greek scroll deciphered with AI

2,000 new characters from burnt-up ancient Greek scroll deciphered with AI

Two long stone tools from the Lincombian–Ranisian–Jerzmanowician (LRJ) culture uncovered at Ranis. Item 1 is a partial bifacial blade point characteristic of the LRJ. Item 2 also contains finely made bifacial leaf points.

Neanderthals and modern humans intermingled in Europe 45,000 years ago

By Laura Baisas

A visual collage of skin fossils described in the new study. The mummified skin specimen is shown sliced into two pieces in the center-left of the image. The surrounding specimen scans are of fossilized skin impressions.

Oldest known fossilized reptile skin was dug up in an Oklahoma quarry

By Lauren Leffer