All posts by Archaeology World Team

NORTH AMERICA, U.S.A, WORLD

Tlingit Objects Repatriated to Alaska Village

Tlingit Objects Repatriated to Alaska Village

A black tote holding Alaska Native artifacts sits on the ground of the Juneau International Airport on Thursday, Nov. 17, 2022. It was flown from Seattle after being filled with 25 Alaska Native artifacts held at George Fox University in Oregon.

Nearing the end of his flight from Seattle to Juneau, Frank Hughes looked out his plane window to the ground below where the outline of the Organized Village of Kake slowly appeared beneath him.

An excitement built in him, one that he said made him feel like his heart had just skipped a beat. Though Hughes has lived in the small Southeast Alaska Native village for years and has come and gone from it too many times to count, this time was different — because he wasn’t alone in coming home.

In the belly of the plane sat a sturdy black bin locked by zip ties and scattered with fragile stickers holding 25 Alaska Native artifacts ranging from spruceroot-woven baskets to ceremonial paddles to headdresses that were taken from the village in the early 1900s.

Many of the pieces are estimated to be more than 200 years old.

“We’re going home,” Hughes said. “These artifacts are coming home.”

Since 2018, Hughes has worked to bring the collections of artifacts that were found at George Fox University in Oregon back to Kake after discovering their existence while doing research for the Native American Grave Protection and Repatriation Act for which he served as coordinator. Hughes said during his work for NAGPRA he had done many Indigenous artifact repatriations across the country, but said he couldn’t believe it when he came across the artifacts from Kake.

Now, after nearly five years of waiting, Hughes, along with Lincoln Bean, vice chairman for the Organized Village of Kake, flew to the university this month to retrieve the artifacts and bring them home. The pair and the bin of artifacts made stops in Seattle and Juneau before heading to Kake on Nov. 18.

“When I looked at them, it was like looking at my past and my elders,” Bean said. “It’s some of the most beautiful art of weaving, headdresses I’ve never seen before. The apron for dancing, with some of the most intricate, beautiful beadwork you’ve ever seen in your life.”

How the collection of this small Southeast Alaska village’s cultural artifacts ended up nearly 1,000 miles away, stored off-display at what bills itself as the No. 1 Christian college in Oregon, is up for debate, Hughes and Bean explained.

The pair said they believe that some of the artifacts may have been given as a gift to visitors of the village. They said it is more likely, however, that most were taken by the Religious Society of Friends in Alaska — also known as Quakers — who built a mission in the village in late 1891, then left after the building was handed over to the Kake Memorial Presbyterian church in 1912.

“They cut it out and took it,” Hughes said about a wooden mask that was part of the collection of artifacts repatriated. The piece was likely the oldest of the collection and served as a marker on a tree identifying the territory. He said the mask would have to have been cut out of the body of the tree to be removed.

Quakers were missionaries in Alaska who during the 1800s and 1900s ran about 30 boarding schools for Indigenous children in the U.S. and its territories, including the Douglas Island Friends Mission School on Douglas Island.

Quakers were part of the historical movement in which many Alaska Native children were sent away from their families, communities and culture to boarding schools in the state — or across the country — and were forced to divorce themselves of their Indigenous identity in exchange for U.S. values and culture.

Though many of the boarding schools were closed by the late 1900s, the legacy of trauma and abuse from these schools still remains for many Alaska Native families and communities.

Hughes said though the pain still permeates from the past, repatriation serves as a way to bring healing to both the people living in Kake today and the spirits that live within the artifacts.

“We’re just trying to bring them home where they came from,” Bean said.

Hughes said when he first saw the artifacts in Oregon, he knew immediately that the spirits of his Tlingit ancestors were there with him.

“When we opened it up, the excitement and the spirits were alive, it’s like walking in an air-conditioned room — the spirits came alive,” Hughes said. “It’s good to see you, we’re happy to see you.”

Bean agreed and said the Tlingit culture is a gift from God and bringing home these items gives him a glimpse of his culture he didn’t know was missing.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Bean said. “It’s powerful looking back on people we know that were here before us — as a family, as a tribe — and it’s tangible, we can touch it.

Tlingit Objects Repatriated to Alaska Village
A black tote holding Alaska Native artifacts sits on the ground of the Juneau International Airport on Thursday afternoon, Nov. 17, 2022. It was flown from Seattle after being filled with 25 Alaska Native artifacts held at George Fox University in Oregon.

Hughes said he and Bean would present the artifacts, still unopened, to the village. Plans to open the box and welcome the artifacts home were on track to commence but likely wouldn’t happen until after Thanksgiving. Bean and Hughes said that the repatriation serves as a step toward healing and rebuilding the parts of their culture that were taken.

“We know who we are, we know where we come from, we know where we’re going,” Bean said.

ASIA, CHINA, WORLD

5,000-yr-old house ruins found in central China

5,000-yr-old house ruins found in central China

Archaeologists have excavated the ruins of house foundations dating back more than 5,000 years in the Yangshao Village site in central China’s Henan Province.

The house was once a large building with rammed earth walls that may have covered more than 130 square meters.

As per speculations, it belongs to the late Yangshao Culture period, said Li Shiwei from Henan Provincial Institute of Cultural Heritage and Archaeology, who is in charge of the excavation site.

“This is the first time that large house ruins have been discovered since the excavation of the Yangshao Village site in 1921.

The findings can provide new materials for studying the types, shapes, and building techniques of houses during the Yangshao Culture period,” Li said.

Archaeologists also unearthed four artificial trenches and a large number of cultural relics at the site, including a jade tomahawk that symbolizes military power.

The discoveries show that the settlement in the Yangshao period boasted a large population, prosperous development, and complete defense facilities, Li said, adding that it is of great significance for studying the complexity and civilization process in the Yellow River basin during the prehistoric period.

In 1921, the first excavation on the Yangshao Village site, which is in Mianchi County, Henan Province, marked the birth of modern Chinese archaeology.

Originating around the middle reaches of the Yellow River, the Yangshao Culture is considered an important stream of Chinese civilization and is widely known for its advanced pottery-making technology.

The fourth archaeological excavation on the Yangshao Village site began on Aug. 22, 2020, and is still in progress. 

ENGLAND, EUROPE, WORLD

Wealthy Medieval Farm Excavated in Northern England

Wealthy Medieval Farm Excavated in Northern England

The site, four miles from Helmsley, was known to be the location of a grange built shortly after the abbey was founded in 1132 to supply it with produce, yet this was the first major excavation.

The farm was managed by the Cistercian monks until the Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1539, and items including rosary beads, pottery and glazed tiles were all found.

It is now thought the grange was of high economic importance and reflected the status of the abbey itself. The glazed roof tiles are ‘almost unheard of’ in farms of the period, and evidence iron smelting took place on the land was also discovered.

Remains of the monastic farm

The National Park Authority’s head of historic environment Miles Johnson said:

“Whilst it’s not surprising that we found evidence of medieval farming, the prestige, and range of the uncovered artifacts point to this being a place of high economic importance.

“For the archaeologists to find a cellar and what we think are glazed roof tiles from a medieval farm of this period is almost unheard of. Some find also relate to the process of iron smelting, which was clearly happening onsite, and indeed there was also an iron hunting arrow.”

The community dig was led by archaeologist John Buglass, founder of North Yorkshire-based JB Archeology, with close involvement from Keith Emerick, Inspector of Ancient Monuments at Historic England. Sixteen volunteers took part, contributing the equivalent of 129 days across six weeks.

Little was known about the site until the dig

John Buglass said: “This is one of those unexpected digs that shows just how much we can still learn from sites we thought we understood.

“Through the hard work of volunteer archaeologists from inside and outside the National Park, we have managed to add some significant understanding to our knowledge of the monastic granges of Rievaulx.”

Keith Emerick of Historic England added: “This is a truly remarkable discovery. Although we know where many monastic farm sites are located, relatively little is known about them. The excavation of such impressive remains and their associated finds adds a huge amount to our understanding of the medieval world.”

The excavations, which covered only a small part of the site, have now been completed, but work on analyzing the finds and interpreting the materials recovered will continue over the next year.

The farm was once wealthy, productive, and of high status

As successful farmers, the Cistercian monks at Rievaulx Abbey had a significant impact on the landscape of the North York Moors. They developed large-scale moorland grazing and stimulated the rapid growth of the wool trade that became so significant in England’s later history. The monks even diverted the course of the River Rye on more than one occasion to allow for their development.

The lead mining, iron ore, and wool sales operations were all highly profitable until the Black Death, after which it became difficult to recruit labour.

Rievaulx Abbey fell into ruin after the monks left following King Henry VIII’s campaign against the power of the Catholic Church. The site is now owned by English Heritage and welcomes visitors.

MEXICO, NORTH AMERICA, WORLD

Maya Stucco Masks Revealed in Mexico

Maya Stucco Masks Revealed in Mexico

These faces, these portraits, look at us from the past, their gaze transports us to the royal court of the ancient and powerful Mayan kingdom.

The Federal Ministry of Culture, through the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), announced that, in 42 years of research work in the archaeological zone of Toniná, archaeologist Juan Yadeun Angulo, has found a diversity of archaeological materials, among which a large number of masks stand out, with various representations in stucco and sculptures, which give an idea of ​​the ancient inhabitants of this city.

The researcher from the INAH Chiapas Center indicates that some of the stucco pieces were found around the structure known as the House of the Recreation of the Universe, which is to the southeast of the Sunken Plaza of the Palacio de Los Caracoles, which date from around from the years 650 to 700 of our era.

Yadeun Angulo explains that these masks, the majority of which were discovered in 2013, and since then, protected and preserved by the INAH, in the archive’s warehouse of the archaeological site, represent themes of the underworld, the earth and the sky, the levels were the lords of Toniná, the rulers and the people in general thought that it was distributed to the world and to the deities.

Likewise, in Toniná, the use of the human face in architecture is clearly seen: “Here the human body is part of the decoration of the buildings”, highlights the archaeologist.

Within the singular collection of masks, the representation of the lord of the underworld found in a crypt of the Temple of the Sun in 2018 stands out first; the archaeologist explains that all the beings of the underworld do not have a lower jaw, which makes it evident that they are dead, in addition to the fact that this representation is clearly a deity with said characteristic.

“This gentleman has the upper jaw and a shark tooth, because they are solar deities and he really is a monstrous doll, it was part of a huge representation, where it was seen how the lords of Toniná have a relationship with fantastic beings from the interior of the earth and of the starry sky”, comments the archaeologist.

The representation of gods from other cultures also stands out, such as that of a totally Teotihuacan Tláloc; Although the piece is fragmented, it presents the typical characteristics of this Central Mexican deity, who we know had a great influence on the Classic Maya, for which Yadeun warns that this sculpture speaks of an evident relationship with the Central Highlands.

In the same way, there are other sculptures that represent rulers who are in the exercise of their power and, therefore, are remembered with all their magnificence. 

The archaeologist also mentions another mask that served as a mannequin and as an element to make jade masks, since masks can still be seen on top of the mask-mannequin.

Yadeun Angulo hopes that in the future they will be able to hold temporary exhibitions to show the public the valuable collection that Toniná keeps since there are collections of full-body sculptures of ruling gods, representations of scenes from the Popol Vuh myth, as well as entire pages, where the twins Hunahpú and Ixbalanqué are seen, who are related to the earth, the beings of the underworld and the sky.

“These faces, these portraits, look at us from the past, their gaze transports us to the royal court of the ancient and powerful Mayan kingdom of Po’o”, concludes the archaeologist. 

EUROPE, SPAIN, WORLD

Early Dog Identified in Spain’s Basque Country

Early Dog Identified in Spain’s Basque Country

A humerus analyzed by the UPV/EHU’s Human Evolutionary Biology group belonged to a specimen that lived in the Paleolithic period, 17,000 years ago.

Early Dog Identified in Spain’s Basque Country
Erralla humerus. a) Anterior view. b) Posterior view. c) Medial view. d) Lateral view.

The dog is the first species domesticated by humans, although the geographical and temporal origin of wolf domestication remains a matter of debate. In an excavation led by Jesus Altuna in the Erralla cave (Zestoa, Gipuzkoa) in 1985 an almost complete humerus was recovered from a canid, a family of carnivores that includes wolves, dogs, foxes and coyotes, among others.

At that time it was difficult to identify which species of canid it belonged to.

Now the Human Evolutionary Biology team at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU), led by Professor Conchi de la Rúa, has carried out an in-depth study of the bone remains.

A morphological, radiometric and genetic analysis has enabled the species to be identified genetically as Canis lupus familiaris (domestic dog).

The direct dating of the humerus by means of carbon-14 using particle accelerator mass spectrometry gives it an age of 17,410–17,096 cal. BP, (calibrated years Before the Present, i.e. the results obtained are adjusted to take into account changes in the global concentration of radiocarbon over time). That means that the Erralla dog lived in the Magdalenian period of the Upper Paleolithic, which makes it one of the most ancient domestic dogs to have existed so far in Europe.

The Erralla dog shares the mitochondrial lineage with the few Magdalenian dogs analyzed so far.

The origin of this lineage is linked to a period of cold climate coinciding with the Last Glacial Maximum, which occurred in Europe around 22,000 years ago.

“These results raise the possibility that wolf domestication occurred earlier than proposed until now, at least in western Europe, where the interaction of Paleolithic hunter-gatherers with wild species, such as the wolf, may have been boosted in areas of glacial refuge (such as the Franco-Cantabrian) during this period of the climate crisis,” explained Conchi de la Rúa, head of the Human Evolutionary Biology group.

AFRICA, SOUTH AFRICA, WORLD

Scientists discover 80,000-year-old bone tools

Scientists discover 80,000-year-old bone tools

Scientists discover 80,000-year-old bone tools
From left to right: experimental debarking in Africa, the bone tool tip after use, Francesco d’Errico making replicas of an experimental bone tool in the field.

Until the beginning of this century, the production of fully worked bone tools was considered an innovation introduced in Europe around 40,000 years ago by modern humans.

Research carried out over the last two decades has led to the discovery of bone tools in several regions of Africa, some of which could date back 100,000 years.

But these early bone tools are rare and non-standardised in shape.

Key cultural innovations

The discovery of 23 bone tools from the Sibudu rock shelter, Kwa Zulu-Natal, South Africa, all with a flattened ogival-shaped end, found in archaeological layers dated between 80,000 and 60,000 years ago, changes the picture.

“Our new study documents the technology and function of the earliest fully shaped bone tools from this region. The discovery of these tools contributes to a better understanding of when and how these innovations arose, and what they were used for,” Francesco d’Errico says. He is the lead author of the paper just published in Scientific Reports.

d’Errico is part of the SapienCE team at the University of Bergen. The SapienCE Centre of Excellence consists of an interdisciplinary team of world-leading scientists. The aim of SapienCE is to improve our understanding of how and when Homo sapiens evolved into who we are today.

Specialised tools for debarking activities

“Our results suggest that the Sibudu double-bevelled tools were not used for hunting or hide processing activities, which are tasks the earliest bone tools have been traditionally associated with, but rather for functions devoted to the exploitation of vegetal resources,” d’Errico explains.

The research was carried out by analysing the use of wear on archaeological and experimental tools with a confocal microscope. This allowed the researchers to measure the roughness parameters of the wear left on the tooltips by use.

Textural and discriminant analysis indicate that most of the bone tools discovered were used in debarking activities, and possibly for digging in humus-rich soil, likely to extract roots or underground storage organs.

Standardised cultural traits

The scientists note that this type of tool continued to be used at this site for 20,000 years, despite the fact that the occupants radically changed the way they produced stone tools during this period.

“These bone tools certainly reflect a local cultural adaptation to a specific environment, as we do not find them elsewhere. Our results support a scenario in which some modern human groups in southern Africa developed and maintained specific, highly standardised cultural traits locally while sharing others across the subcontinent,” d’Errico says.

Complex technical systems

This also implies that MSA peoples had networks allowing the sharing of similar technologies, cultural practices, and new innovations over large territories, while simultaneously maintaining local cultural traits and traditions.

This study confirms that Middle Stone populations already had complex technical systems to help them gather a variety of resources.

The bark of the trees on which the researchers conducted the debarking experiments is not edible but still used in traditional African medicine.

The bark may have been used already 80,000 years ago for similar purposes by Southern African early modern humans.

EUROPE, ITALY, WORLD

Roman Colosseum’s Sewers Investigated With Robots

Roman Colosseum’s Sewers Investigated With Robots

Roman Colosseum’s Sewers Investigated With Robots
The Colosseum is one of Italy’s most popular tourist sites

Spectators at Rome’s ancient gladiator arena, the Colosseum, may have enjoyed snacks of olives, fruit and nuts, archaeologists have found.

Food fragments of figs, grapes, cherries, blackberries, walnuts and more have been unearthed at the site. Archaeologists also found the bones of bears and big cats that were probably used in the arena’s hunting games.

The discoveries were made by archaeologists examining the 2,000-year-old landmark’s sewers.

Relics like these provide a snapshot into the “experience and habits of those who came to this place during the long days dedicated to the performances”, said Alfonsina Russo, Director of the Colosseum Archaeological Park.

Researchers say bones from bears and lions were probably left by animals that were forced to fight each other and gladiators for entertainment. Smaller animal bones belonging to dogs were also found.

The study began in January 2021 and involved the clearance of around 70m (230ft) of drains and sewers under the Colosseum, which remains one of Italy’s most visited landmarks.

Specialist architects and archaeologists used wire-guided robots to navigate the arena’s complex drainage system – aiding their understanding of daily life in Rome as well as ancient hydraulic structures, researchers said.

The Colosseum was the biggest amphitheatre in the Roman Empire, falling into disuse around 523 AD. It was famous for hosting gladiatorial fights and other public spectacles in front of crowds of tens of thousands.

Ancient coins were also discovered in the dig, including 50 bronze coins dating back to the late Roman period, spanning roughly 250-450AD and a silver commemorative coin from around 170-171AD celebrating 10 years of Emperor Marcus Aurelius’ rule.

EUROPE, SWITZERLAND, WORLD

Medieval Woman’s Burial in Switzerland Yields Gold Brooch

Medieval Woman’s Burial in Switzerland Yields Gold Brooch

An excavation of a 7th Century grave site in Switzerland has thrown up a “spectacular” kind of jewellery and afforded valuable insight into medieval society.

A golden brooch was found among other valuable artefacts at the Basel burial site.

The 15 graves belonged to wealthy people of that time who were buried in their finery. The most significant find was a golden robe brooch belonging to a woman aged about 20 at her death.

The woman was also buried with a treasure trove of other jewellery, including 160 pearls, an amber pendant and a belt with an iron buckle and a silver-inlaid tongue.

Other graves revealed high society occupants adorned with highly crafted ornaments.

The archaeological site in Basel, northwest Switzerland, has been excavated over a number of years. In the summer, the body of a warrior was uncovered with a significant head injury caused by a sword blow.

The latest graves were discovered when workers were laying new heating pipes in the city.

“It appears to be a hotspot, a special place where particularly wealthy people were buried,” said Basel cantonal archaeologist Guido Lassau.

Excavations will resume in January and plans are being made to display the finds in a public exhibition.