Archaeology (Page 9)

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

Latest in Archaeology

This Gua Sireh Cave art was drawn with charcoal on limestone save walls and is dated between 1670 to 1830 CE. Two geometric figures, with one prominently wielding a weapon are featured.

Newly dated cave art tells a dark story in Borneo’s history

By Laura Baisas

Plaster casts of the remains of Pompeii's victims. In the Nineteenth Century, archaeologist Giuseppe Fiorelli developed a technique using plaster to study the remains of the victims of Mount Vesuvius’ furious eruption.

Pompeii’s archaeological puzzles can be solved with a little help from chemistry

By Laura Baisas

The remains of a Bronze Age cauldron and an artistic reconstruction of what it may have looked like thousands of years ago.

Bronze Age cauldrons show we’ve always loved meat, dairy, and fancy cookware

By Laura Baisas

Three human skulls sitting on a shelf. Cranial modification has been used for millennia to reshape the human skull.

Japan’s Hirota people intentionally reshaped their skulls more than 1,000 years ago

By Laura Baisas

Men pose outside of Michigan State University’s first observatory, circa 1888. The observatory is located behind where Willis House now stands on MSU’s campus, just south of Grand River and north of West Circle Drive in North Neighborhood.

Michigan State students help unearth a 19th-century space observatory on campus

By Laura Baisas

Closeup photo of water pipe segments fitted together in situ at Pingliangtai.

Ceramic pipes kept this town from flooding during monsoons 4,000 years ago

By Laura Baisas

Archaeologists dig in the dirt with a brush and scraper.

Mysterious skull points to a possible new branch on human family tree

By Laura Baisas

Bronze Age arrow made of meteoric iron

This archaic arrowhead might be made from iron that fell from space

By Sara Kiley Watson

The physical reconstruction of the necklace found in the Neolithic village of Ba’ja in Jordan. It has about 16 strands of beads that meet together in a circle with a gemstone in it and three other strands on top.

Ancient child’s grave holds intricate necklace with more than 2,000 stones

By Laura Baisas

Colorful gemstones nearly arranged. Iron content correlates to the signature purple hue in amethysts and elements including chromium, vanadium, and copper also impact a gem’s color.

Gemstones carry the tale of their geographic origins

By Laura Baisas

NASA astronaut Buzz Aldrin walking across Tranquility Base with equipment after the Apollo 11 moon landing. Black and white photo.

Space junk is a precious treasure trove to some archaeologists

A mountain rises above the buildings of Machu Picchu. The former Inca royal estate stands at the meeting point between the Peruvian Andes and the Amazon Basin and is made up of close to 200 structures.

Machu Picchu was home to ancient people from all over South America

By Laura Baisas

An aerial view of Mont Saint-Michel in northern France. The Paris Basin region is known for prehistoric funerary sites archaeologists use to study early neolithic settlements.

Scientists build intricate Neolithic family tree from 7,000-year-old DNA

By Laura Baisas

A group of colorful spices on a wooden table with a mortar and pestle.

Leftovers of a 2,000-year-old curry discovered on stone cooking tools

By Laura Baisas

An artistic reconstruction showing how this 300,000 year-old stick would have been thrown on a hunt. Two men stand in a shallow body of water, with one aiming the stick towards three birds.

A javelin-like stick shows early humans may have been keen woodworkers

By Laura Baisas

A recreation drawing of “The Ivory Lady.” Her remains date back to the Copper Age and her individual burial and the treasures in her tomb indicate that she possibly held the highest status in her society. She is seated above other members who are attentively listening to her. She is also adorned in a red top with a headdress.

Treasures from the ‘Ivory Lady’ tomb reveal a Copper Age woman’s extraordinary power

By Laura Baisas

A painting of a group of prehistoric residents of Tabon Cave in the Philippines, featuring four individuals of varying ages, using fiber technology at Tabon Cave, 39 to 33,000 years ago. It was painted by Carole Chwval for the exhibition "Trajectories and Movements of the Philippine Identity," curated by Hermine Xhauflair and Eunice Averion.

Damage on 39,000-year-old tools may reveal a prehistoric ‘Age of Bamboo’

By Laura Baisas

A fresco painted on a wall in the ancient city of Pompeii that depicts a focaccia with fruit and possibly pesto sauce on it. It is served on a silver tray and has a wine chalice next to it.

A fresco discovered in Pompeii looks like ancient pizza—but it’s likely focaccia

By Laura Baisas

Close-up photos of three fossil animal specimens from the same area and time horizon as the fossil hominin tibia studied by the research team. These fossils show similar cut marks to those found on the hominin tibia studied. The photos show (a) an antelope mandible, (b) an antelope radius (lower front leg bone) and (c) a large mammal scapula (shoulder blade).

Cut-up prehistoric bone raises questions about early human cannibalism

By Laura Baisas

An aerial view of the excavation site in Tiel, Netherlands. The excavation of the 4,000 year old sanctuary began in 2017.

Newly discovered ‘Stonehenge of the Netherlands’ is 4,000 years old

By Laura Baisas

Examples of engravings discovered in the Roche-Cotard cave (Indre et Loire - France). On the left, the "circular panel" (ogive-shaped tracings) and on the right the "wavy panel" (two contiguous tracings forming sinuous lines).

Neanderthals were likely creating art 57,000 years ago

By Laura Baisas

An archaeologist uncovers a skull and bones. The Trumpington Cross was found during the excavation of the burial in 2012.

This 7th-century teen was buried with serious bling—and we now know what she may have looked like

By Laura Baisas

This ancient Egyptian vessel once held a hallucinogenic brew

This ancient Egyptian vessel once held a hallucinogenic brew

By Sara Kiley Watson

Lucy, our ancient human ancestor, was super buff

Lucy, our ancient human ancestor, was super buff

By Sara Kiley Watson

Humans ventured through Asia’s forests much earlier than we thought

Humans ventured through Asia’s forests much earlier than we thought

By Sara Kiley Watson

Scientists use AI to help uncover elusive Nazca lines

Scientists use AI to help uncover elusive Nazca lines

By Sara Kiley Watson

An entrance to the Dinaledi Chamber of the Rising Star Cave system, part of the Cradle of Humankind World Heritage Site near Johannesburg, South Africa. Newly found grave sites and wall engravings have led a team of archeologists to reevaluate the meaning-making capacity of an early human ancestor, Homo naledi.

Extinct human cousins may have beaten us to inventing burial rituals

By Laura Baisas

An conservator from English Heritage looks at one of over 50 pairs of tweezers Roman men and women used to remove armpit hair.

The Roman Britons cared a lot about hair removal, and it shows in artifacts

By Laura Baisas

Notre Dame de Paris cathedral on sunny day

Workers rely on medieval era tech to reconstruct the Notre Dame

A microphone on a dark stage.

A lost ‘bawdy bard’ act reveals roots of naughty British comedy

By Laura Baisas

A close up of a skull and teeth.

Plague DNA was just found in 4,000-year-old teeth

By Laura Baisas

An older couple shares a kiss against a backdrop of fall trees.

Ancient Mesopotamian texts show when and why humans first kissed

By Jocelyn Solis-Moreira

An aerial view of a desert kite in the Jebel az-Zilliyat region of Saudi Arabia. The kite dates back to the Stone Age and was a kind of hunting trap.

Blueprints engraved in stone from Saudi Arabia and Jordan could be the world’s oldest

By Laura Baisas

The skull of a victim of the explosion of earthquakes that accompanied the explosion of Mount Vesuvius in 79 ce.

‘Violent’ earthquakes accompanied the infamous volcanic eruption that buried Pompeii

By Laura Baisas

A rock called Grotte Mandrin with a mountain in Mediterranean France. The cave records some of the earliest migrations of Homo Sapiens in Europe.

Humans and Neanderthals could have lived together even earlier than we thought

By Laura Baisas

Ligurian plates recovered from the hospital waste dump that date back to the second half of the 16th century CE.

Renaissance-era doctors used to taste their patients’ pee

By Laura Baisas

Red cherry shaped as butt on orange and purple ombre background

A scientific exploration of big juicy butts

By Rachel Feltman

An artist's impression of Watling Lodge fortlet, which also once stood along the Antonine Wall, and would have been similar to the fortlet discovered near Carleith Farm.

Archaeologists found a lost Roman fortlet in Scotland

By Laura Baisas

Emae Island, one of the Outlier islands located in Central Vanuatu.

‘Fingerprints’ confirm the seafaring stories of adventurous Polynesian navigators

By Laura Baisas

An animal coffin with a human-headed part-eel, part-cobra figure wearing a double crown. The figure is associated with Atum, an ancient Egyptian god of pre-existence and post-existence.

Ancient Egyptians mummified animals and put them in beautiful tiny coffins

By Laura Baisas

Ancient Maya idol in Copán, Guatemala

Ancient Maya masons had a smart way to make plaster stronger

The dig at the Villa of the Quintilii. The cella vinaria are in the foreground and treading floor and presses are behind.

This ancient Roman villa was equipped with wine fountains

By Laura Baisas

Scottish Tartans Authority chair John McLeish (right) and tartan historian Peter MacDonald (left), bring the Glen Affric tartan to V&A Dundee curator James Wylie (center) to be exhibited for the first time at the museum.

Slàinte mhath! The oldest piece of Scottish tartan fabric has been identified.

By Laura Baisas

Two Swahili women in traditional headwear and dresses. Black and white portrait.

Ancient DNA confirms Swahilis’ blended African and Asian ancestry

By Jocelyn Solis-Moreira

Notre Dame cathedral in Paris with scaffolding and construction work following a fire in 2019.

The Notre Dame fire revealed a long-lost architectural marvel

By Laura Baisas

Underwater image of sunken ship, Ironton, in Lake Huron

Get a high-tech tour of the long-lost Ironton shipwreck discovered in the Great Lakes

Mexico's Monte Alban archaeological site, including stone step and structures with mountains in the distance.

What the longest-lasting Mesoamerican cities all had in common

By Laura Baisas

The skeleton of a possible Yamnaya horse rider.

People may have been riding horses as early as 5,000 years ago

The entrance to the Mycenae citadel in Greece called the Lion Gate.

Details of life in Bronze Age Mycenae could lie at the bottom of a well

By Laura Baisas

A scientist holds up a tooth recovered from an archaeological dig in Denmark.

Scientists tracked the plague’s journey through Denmark using really old teeth

By Laura Baisas

$Recreations of tiny points found in Grotte Mandrin that were reproduced using the same flint and replicating the same technologies from thousands of years ago. These experimental points were then used as arrowheads and shot by bow to analyze the categories of fractures appearing on these arrowheads and compare them with the scars found on the archeological material.$

Archery may have helped humans gain leverage over Neanderthals

By Laura Baisas

A 6.3 inch long phallus shaped artifact that was discovered in England, at the Roman fort of Vindolanda.

Scientists think they found a 2,000-year-old dildo in ancient Roman ruins

By Laura Baisas

Fossil hippo skeleton and associated Oldowan artifacts at the Nyayanga site in July 2016.

2.9 million-year-old tools found in Kenya stir up a ‘fascinating whodunnit’

By Laura Baisas

Ruins of Linlithgow Castle, near Edinburgh, Scotland, the birthplace of Mary, Queen of Scots.

Codebreakers have finally deciphered the lost letters of Mary, Queen of Scots

By Laura Baisas

An uncooked brown crab sitting among among seaweed and water.

Neanderthals caught and cooked crabs 90,000 years ago

By Laura Baisas

A scan of a mastodon skeleton with an arrow pointing to the trajectory of the spear.

Ancient humans used mastodon bones to hunt the giant beasts

By Laura Baisas

a colorful illustration of ancient egyptians wearing robes embalming a dead body with wrappings and chemicals

This is the best look yet into ancient Egyptians’ mummy-making chemicals

By Jocelyn Solis-Moreira

ancient-style illustration of poseidon and workers building seawall

Inside the project to bring ‘self-healing’ Roman concrete to American shorelines

Am ancient Egyptian statue of a person with short hair from a recently discovered burial site.

A gold-laced mummy could be the ‘oldest and most complete’ specimen found in Egypt

By Laura Baisas

An overview of mummified crocodiles during an excavation.

Ancient Egyptians had a unique way of mummifying crocodiles

By Laura Baisas

A lost temple for Poseidon may have finally been rediscovered

A lost temple for Poseidon may have finally been rediscovered

By Sara Kiley Watson

A drawing dating back to the Ice Age on a cave with markings circled.

Cave drawings from 20,000 years ago may feature an early form of writing

By Laura Baisas

A still from a 3D model of the 16th-century ship found at Dungeness quarry

A ship from the 16th century was just dredged up in England

By Laura Baisas

An archeologist’s quest to find seafood’s place on the ancient Mediterranean menu

An archeologist’s quest to find seafood’s place on the ancient Mediterranean menu

By Paul Greenberg / Hakai Magazine