All posts by Archaeology World Team

A perfectly preserved 700-year-old mummy in brown liquid looked only a few months old

A perfectly preserved 700-year-old mummy in brown liquid looked only a few months old

The skin of a mummy discovered by accident had been perfectly preserved for over 700 years. Road workers stumbled upon a jaw-dropping corpse belonging to a high-ranking woman from China’s Ming Dynasty.

A perfectly preserved 700-year-old mummy in brown liquid looked only a few months old
An extremely well-preserved female corpse was found on March 1, 2011

News of the remarkable archaeological breakthrough on in the city of Taizhou, in eastern China on March 1 2011 was first broken to the world’s press a decade ago.

A team expanding a street in the Jiangsu Province dug up by chance two wooden tombs believed to date back to China’s ruling power between 1368 and 1644.

Just six-and-a-half feet below the road surface was the woman whose features shoes and ring all remained intact and showed hardly any signs of deterioration.

A ring survived 700 years on the woman’s finger

Chinese archaeologists were immediately called from the nearby Museum of Taizhou to inspect the body and were stunned by the condition of almost everything from the woman’s skin and hair right down to her eyelashes.

Experts claimed it was as though the diminutive 4’9 woman found swamped in a mysterious brown liquid, had only died recently.

Taizhou was reportedly buzzing off the discovery which included a ring still fixed on a finger belonging to the long-dead woman.

Researchers said what she was clothed in on her death married up with the traditional costume of the Ming dynasty, as did various ceramics, ancient writings and other relics inside her coffin.

The coffin contained a mysterious brown liquid

Oddly bones which did not belong to the corpse were also buried with her.

It was the first discovery of a mummy in the region in three years and the sixth since 1979.

Previous findings sparked an interest in learning how corpses remained so well preserved from the Ming Dynasty and what rituals were involved in the mummification process.

Director of the Museum of Taizhou, Wang Weiyin, explained mummy tended to be clad in silk and a little cotton but both are difficult to keep in a good condition.

Excavations found that achieving such brilliant corpse preservation required technology used exclusively at very high-profile funerals.

Archaeologists from the Museum of Taizhou responded to the accidental discovery

Archaeologists have found a previously unknown Roman city with buildings of monumental proportions in Spain’s Aragon Region

Archaeologists have found a previously unknown Roman city with buildings of monumental proportions in Spain’s Aragon Region

Archaeologists from the University of Zaragoza in Spain have discovered a previously unknown Roman city with buildings of monumental proportions.

Archaeologists have found a previously unknown Roman city with buildings of monumental proportions in Spain’s Aragon Region

The urban complex, which existed between the first and second centuries, had “buildings of immense sizes” as well as public facilities including baths, water supply, streets, and sewers.

Researchers thought the 10-acre site, also located at Artieda, in the Aragon region of northeastern Spain, was home to several separate archaeological sites, including San Pedro and the Rein Hermitage.

In 2018, Artieda City Council asked the University of Zaragoza’s Department of Archeology for help in examining some of the remains found around the San Pedro hermitage, known variously as El Forau de la Tuta, Campo de la Virgen, or Campo del Royo.

And after 3 years of research, experts have confirmed that these sites form one large single archaeological complex. El Forau de la Tuta is the name for everything now, since the team realized they’re all one interconnected city. Until the real name of the city is revealed, of course!

A Corinthian capital and fluted drum with a shaft located in Artieda’s San Pedro hermitage.

The team published the results of their 3 years of work in a report, El Forau de la Tuta: A Hitherto Unknown Roman Imperial City on the Southern Slopes of the Pyrenees.

The team detected two phases of occupation on the surface of the site: one during the Roman imperial period (the 1st to 5th centuries) and another during the early-medieval Christian era (the 9th to 13th centuries).

The researchers discovered two streets, the whispers of sidewalks, four rudimentary cement sewer outlets, one life-sized marble hand of a presumed public monument, and even the reception room of a thermal bath—complete with mosaics preserved by the collapsed sandstone ceiling.

They did this by combining remote sensing techniques like georadar and aerial images with conventional methods.

This magnificent find features two cupids riding seahorses and is decorated with shell and scallop designs.

A detail of the black and white mosaic was found at the Forau de la Tuta site in 2021.

The report states that the settlement was “of urban character—the city’s name is currently unknown—and it developed during the [Roman] imperial period”.

The researchers also learned that the settlement had another life as a rural habitat during the Visigoth and early Andalusian periods. A medieval peasant village sat atop the Roman ruins from the ninth to 13th centuries.

The El Forau de la Tuta location lies 1.5 kilometres from Artieda’s city centre, in the lush Aragón River plain.

It is located within a 390-meter long and 140-meter broad agricultural area.

It is four hectares in size, but it’s likely that the site is significantly bigger and that it encompasses other, as-yet-undiscovered agricultural areas.

Graves at Williamsburg’s First Baptist Church Will Be Excavated

Graves at Williamsburg’s First Baptist Church Will Be Excavated

Descendants, archaeologists and researchers alike gathered Monday for the long-awaited beginning of burial excavations at the original First Baptist Church site.

Colonial Williamsburg Director of Archaeology Jack Gary answers questions about the burial excavation process following the ancestral blessing ceremony held at the Nassau Street Site of First Baptist Church on Monday. Courtesy of Let Freedom Ring Foundation
Colonial Williamsburg Director of Archaeology Jack Gary answers questions about the burial excavation process following the ancestral blessing ceremony held at the Nassau Street Site of First Baptist Church on Monday. Courtesy of Let Freedom Ring Foundation

The First Baptist Church descendant community unanimously voted in March to begin excavating three grave shafts in order to learn the race, age, sex and anything else about the people buried on the site. Since archaeologists began digging in September 2020, the original foundation of the church, a structure dating to 1865 and 41 graves have been identified.

Members of several congregations who are descendants of early Williamsburg residents gathered to view the opening of the graves. The ancestral blessing ceremony that was performed before the work began included a mix of prayers and song — a solemn and moving moment, said Connie Matthews Harshaw, president of the Let Freedom Ring Foundation. The group has been working since 2018 to preserve the church, its history and artefacts that date to the 18th century.

“My heart is full. It was a moving tribute this morning. The day was all about the descendants,” Harshaw said. “We wanted the descendants to have an opportunity to voice what their ancestors may be thinking or saying.”

The 41 burial sites, which are rectangular holes about two feet wide and five feet deep, have been primarily identified because of their surface appearance, according to The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation. One of the chosen graves was marked by an upside-down wine bottle, making it the only marked grave identified so far.

The process will take about two months. It will include confirming the presence of human remains, determining how long they’ve been there and assessing if the conditions permit further testing. If conditions allow, osteological and DNA testing will be done on the remains.

DNA testing will determine the eye colour, skin tone, propensity for certain diseases or conditions, genetic ancestry and biological connections of the person.

The osteological analysis can fill in some gaps of the DNA testing by examining the bones — age at death, stature, injuries, illnesses, physical stresses, quality of life and place of origin.

The DNA testing will require two samples from each subject and removing bone for that testing. The bones will then be fully excavated and moved to the Institute for Historical Biology on William & Mary’s campus for cleaning and analysis. Any artefacts found in the graves will be cleaned and catalogued in Colonial Williamsburg’s archaeological library.

The osteological and DNA analyses will take six months to a year. After the testing is done, all remains and artefacts will be reinterred in the original site. Then finally, hopefully, the descendants will have their answers.

Members of the First Baptist Church descendant community gathered at the church’s Nassau Street site for an ancestral blessing ceremony on Monday, preceding the excavation of three of the burial sites. Courtesy of Let Freedom Ring Foundation

“It has to be heartening for the descendant community because if you think about it, these people have laid there for more than 66 years under a parking lot at first, unrecognized,” Harshaw said. “If you stand still in the moment and think about the fact that what this means for the descendant community and their involvement in this process, this is really an example for the nation to follow in what we call community archaeology.”

The testing will allow researchers to establish a connection between the buried and the First Baptist Church and possibly help descendants find their ancestors’ final burial place.

“Every step of this process has been descendant-driven. … It wasn’t a decision for [Colonial Williamsburg]. It was not a decision for Let Freedom Ring. It wasn’t a decision for the church,” Harshaw said.

“It was the descendant community that will drive what happens on this site, with this site, how it’s interpreted because that’s the right thing to do.”

Portuguese scientists discover a 100,000-year-old case of deafness

Portuguese scientists discover a 100,000-year-old case of deafness

Around 100,000 years ago somewhere in Morocco a hunter-gatherer started stumbling about suffering vertigo and hearing loss.

Portuguese scientists discover a 100,000-year-old case of deafness

Now, almost 50 years since parts of his skeleton were found as fossils, scientists in Coimbra University have announced the discovery of the “oldest case of deafness in a human being”.

Indeed, from the symptoms, it sounds suspiciously like the hunter-gatherer in question was suffering not just from deafness, but from chronic ear infection.

Explains Lusa, the fossil, tagged as ‘Dar-es-Soltane II H5′ was studied using what is called a micro-CT scan, “also known as computer-assisted microtomography.

“It is similar to a hospital CAT scan, but with a better resolution and which allows a more detailed observation. The observation of the micro-CT and the 3D  reconstruction was done with specific software,” says Dany Coutinho Nogueira, a researcher at the Centre for Research in Anthropology and Health (CIAS) of the Faculty of Science and Technology of the University of Coimbra (FCTUC).

According to Coutinho Nogueira, the temporal bone (where the auditory system is housed) is very important.

“One part of this bone, the ‘pars petrosa’, is made up of the densest bone in the human body, which sometimes allows better preservation in ancient fossils. This part contains the organs of hearing (cochlea) and balance (semicircular canals), which are studied in paleoanthropology to distinguish human groups (the morphology of this structure in Homo Sapiens is different from those of Neanderthals),” he explained.

When observing the semicircular canals of this fossil (a skull, complete with jawbone), to confirm which human group it belonged to, the FCTUC researcher noticed that “the canals were partially ossified, that is, they had bone in parts where they should not have”.

The study revealed that the individual suffered from ‘labyrinthitis ossificans’, a disease “that causes the ossification of the semicircular canals and the cochlea”.

This condition “implies balance problems, dizziness, vertigo and hearing loss. This pathology is very incapacitating for a hunter-gatherer – limiting the ability to hunt and find food”, said Coutinho Nogueira.

The limited survival time of the individual after the onset of the disease calls into question the cause of death, he added.

The individual died a few months after the onset of the pathology. He could not have survived that long without help from other individuals because he would not have been able to acquire food and hunt, “which indicates to us that there was a form of monitoring from the rest of the group, at least for a few months,” said the scientist.

According to Coutinho Nogueira, this study provides new information about the state of health of past populations, “in particular hunter-gatherers, and also shows that recent technologies allow discovering new information and detecting pathologies on fossils discovered almost 50 years ago”.

Dany Coutinho Nogueira stressed that only two fossils of Homo Sapiens hunter-gatherers present this pathology, “the other was from Singa (a skull discovered in Sudan in 1924 and the target of a scientific study in 1998)”.

“They are the two oldest identified cases of acquired deafness in our species,” he stressed.

The results of the University of Coimbra researchers’ study were recently published in the International Journal of Paleopathology.

7.5 Million Annual Elephant Skulls Fossil Were Found in Turkey “Choerolophodon Pentelic”

7.5 Million Annual Elephant Skulls Fossil Were Found in Turkey “Choerolophodon Pentelic”

A complete skull fossil from 7.5 million years ago was discovered on the bank of the Yamula Dam in the central Kayseri Province of Turkey. This is a major discovery. The skull belongs to Choerolophodon Pentelic, known as the ancestor of elephants.

7.5 Million Annual Elephant Skulls Fossil Were Found in Turkey “Choerolophodon Pentelic”

The study of the fossils found last year was carried out by one of the few experts on Proboscidea – the taxonomic order of African mammals – in the world, Kayseri Metropolitan Municipality said in a statement.

The statement stated that Juha Saarinen, a professor in the Department of Earth Sciences and Geography at the University of Helsinki, came to Kayseri and completed the final examination of the skull.

Okşan Başoğlu, head of the excavation team which continues working at the discovery site, said the Finnish scientist Saarinen “worked on the big and complete skull for two full days.”

“This will be published in a very respected journal abroad because it is a very significant fossil,” she quoted Saarinen as saying.

Juha Saarinen works on the elephant skull, Kayseri, central Turkey, (AA Photo)

Başoğlu said it would be a benchmark for them and soon the names of Kayseri and Yamula would take their place in the world’s literature on the subject.

“For this reason, it is a very essential development for us. Kayseri, in one sense, will be a centre of palaeontology,” she said, referring to the study of the history of life on Earth based on fossils.

She said studies in the laboratory are continuously ongoing.

Saarinen, who has worked in many areas from Europe to the Middle East and China to the US, stated that the complete skull fossil belonging to Choerolophodon Pentelic is the only specimen in the world and it is larger in mass than any fossil elephant found in other contemporary fossils. localities of the world.

When it comes to the fully preserved and unique skull specimens and other fossils found in the province, he said that Kayseri will become a reference point for international palaeontology.

In previous studies in the region, samples of giraffes, 4-5 species known as the ancestors of elephants, rhinoceros, triple hoofed horses, and wasp were found.

5,200-year-old stone carving chrysalis found in north China

5,200-year-old stone carving chrysalis found in north China

According to the provincial archaeological research institute, archaeologists discovered a stone-carved silkworm chrysalis dating back at least 5,200 years in north China’s Shanxi Province last month.

5,200-year-old stone carving chrysalis found in north China

The stone-carved chrysalis was discovered in a semi-crypt house at the Shangguo Site in Wenxi County, near the city of Yuncheng. It measures 2.8 cm long, with a maximum abdominal diameter of 1.2 cm.

Archaeologists surmised that this home dates to the early stage of the late Yangshao Culture era, some 5,200 years ago, based on pottery fragments that have been discovered.

The Yangshao culture was a Neolithic culture that existed extensively along the middle reaches of the Yellow River in China from around 5000 BC to 3000 BC.

This culture is famous for its red-painted pottery, one of the two main types produced in the neolithic period in China, and before 2000 BC Yangshao was making spiral red earthenware pots fired in ovens at 1000°C-1500°C.

A model of Jiangzhai, a Yangshao village.

Yangshao artisans created fine white, red, and black painted pottery with human facial, animal, and geometric designs, and they did not use pottery wheels in pottery-making.

China News Service, Taiyuan, July 16 (Yang Peipei and Hu Jian) ​​The Wenxi Shangguo site in Shanxi released the latest archaeological results on the 16th. The site unearthed the Yangshao period and pottery models in the early Spring and Autumn Period.

The excavation further confirmed that the Shangguo site has two main periods, namely the middle and late Yangshao period and the late Western Zhou period to the Spring and Autumn period.

The excavation site in 2022 is selected to be adjacent to the west and north of the exploration in 2021. The excavation covers an area of ​​500 square meters.

Various relics have been found, including 2 ash ditch, 56 ash pits (including 7 house sites in the Yangshao era), 2 stove sites, 1044 pottery models, 183 pottery ware, 14 jade ware, 157 stone tools, 123 bone tools, 4 small copperware, 7 copper slag, 46 shellfish, 2 ironware, 4 egg shells, and 1 fruit stone unearthed. 1585 pieces.

Large water vessel of the late Yangshao culture; from Shaanxi, Shanxi or Gansu province; 4th millennium BC; Rietberg Museum (Zürich, Switzerland)

Among them, H50 is bag-shaped. Judging from the pottery pieces such as the red pottery and sand pots with piled patterns on the outside of the unearthed mouth, the white-robed pottery bowls, and the basket-shaped pointed bottom bottle belly pieces, they belong to the early stage of the late Yangshao period, about 5,200 years ago.

The pit is divided into four layers, and a stone-carved silkworm chrysalis was unearthed in the first layer.

Over the past 100 years, relics related to the silkworm culture have been unearthed in many places in Yuncheng City, said Tian Jianwen, a researcher with the provincial archaeology research institute.

“At present, many silkworm cocoons and chrysalises discovered in Yuncheng City have been found in good condition, indicating that the ancestors of Yangshao Culture in southern Shanxi had raised silkworms,” said Tian. The discovery of stone carving chrysalises provided important clues for the study of the origin and spread of silk, according to Tian.

Ancient grave found right under kindergarten

Ancient grave found right under kindergarten

Builders found human bones when doing reconstruction on a kindergarten in Brestovany, a village near Trnava. They called archaeologists from the Monuments Board of Trnava and the Western Slovakia Museum in Trnava who found that the builders had discovered a grave.

More detailed research showed that it is a 4,000-year-old grave from the Early Bronze Age containing women’s jewels, such as bone beads, a copper bracelet and two willow-shaped earrings, the Monuments Board Trnava informed.

The skeleton belonged to a woman buried in a curled position on her left side.

Ancient grave found right under kindergarten

Based on the found objects and the character of the grave, archaeologists were able to classify the discovery as from the Early Bronze Age, specifically to the bearers of the so-called Nitra culture.

It belongs to the oldest culture of the Bronze Age in Slovakia and its representatives are characterised by the gradual introduction of bronze production, an alloy of already used copper with tin, which resulted in the metal of better strength and hardness. 

“Uncovering the grave was a bit different than usual because all the classes of the local primary school and kindergarten arrived to watch our research and discoveries,” archaeologist Peter Grznár said.

Uncovering the grave thus changed to a live exhibition of archaeologists’ work and lessons about the life and tradition of our ancestors.

The kindergarten is located in the area of the national cultural monument manor house and park in the cadastral area of Malé Brestovany.

The manor house dates to the period of classicism from the first half of the 19th century. However, its location on a slight ridge is interesting, which could have also been attractive as a prehistoric settlement.

Severe Drought Unveils Ruins of Hidden Ancient ‘Bridge of Nero’ in Rome

Severe Drought Unveils Ruins of Hidden Ancient ‘Bridge of Nero’ in Rome

After a period of unusually hot weather and low rainfall, it’s now possible to see the resurfaced remains of an ancient bridge in the Tiber River in Rome, Italy.

A severe drought in Italy has revealed an archaeological treasure in Rome: a bridge reportedly built by the Roman emperor Nero that is usually submerged under the waters of the Tiber River. 

The dropping water levels of the Tiber, which according to Reuters(opens in new tab) is flowing at multi-year lows, have exposed the stone remains of the Pons Neronianus (Latin for the Bridge of Nero), WION News, a news agency headquartered in New Delhi, India, reported. 

Emperor Nero, who ruled as the Roman Empire’s fifth emperor from A.D. 54 to 68, was a controversial sovereign who built public structures and won military victories abroad, but also neglected politics and instead focused much of his time and passion on the arts, music and chariot races.

Rome’s coffers were also drained during his rule, partly as a result of building the “Domus Aurea” (the Golden Palace), which Nero built in the centre of Rome after the great fire. During his reign, he killed his mother and at least one of his wives, and he struggled to rebuild Rome after a huge fire ravaged the city in A.D. 64. Nero killed himself in A.D. 68 at the age of 30 after being declared a public enemy by the Roman senate.

Live Science talked to several experts, who noted that the remains of this bridge have become visible in the past due to low water levels. They also note that, despite its name, it’s not certain if this bridge was built by Nero. 

“The remains of this Roman bridge are visible whenever the water level of the Tiber falls, therefore whenever there are lengthy periods — like now — of very low rainfall,” Robert Coates-Stephens, an archaeologist at the British School at Rome, told Live Science in an email. 

Multiple sources told Live Science that the bridge was possibly built before Nero’s rule. “The origins of the bridge are uncertain, given that it is likely a bridge existed here before Nero’s reign and therefore the Pons Neronianus was probably a reconstruction of an earlier crossing,” Nicholas Temple, professor of architectural history at London Metropolitan University, told Live Science in an email.

The name Pons Neronianus “appears for the first time only in the 12th-century catalogues of Rome’s monuments,” Coates-Stephens said. “It’s true that Nero had extensive gardens and properties in the area of the Vatican, and so a bridge at this point would have given easy access to these.”

Bad place to build?

Hidden ancient Roman 'Bridge of Nero' emerges from the Tiber during severe drought
After a period of unusually hot weather and low rainfall, it’s now possible to see the resurfaced remains of an ancient bridge in the Tiber River in Rome, Italy.

A number of scholars told Live Science that the bridge was constructed on a poorly chosen site. 

The bridge “was built on a tight bend in a floodplain,” which is “a terrible idea,” Rabun Taylor, a classics professor at the University of Texas at Austin, told Live Science in an email.

“River bends cutting through pure sediment tend to wander and change shape, so their banks are prone to losing contact with bridge abutments” that connect the bridge to the ground, Taylor said. 

He noted that “that’s probably what happened to Nero’s bridge — and it may well have happened by the mid-200s A.D., less than two centuries after Nero’s death.” Taylor’s research into the bridge’s history “suggests the bridge was dismantled at about that time, and the stone piers were reassembled to create a new bridge in a more stable area downstream.

The Pons Neronianus connected Rome to an area that didn’t have a lot of development at the time. While one side of the river had the Campus Martius, a drained wetland that at this point in time had some public buildings (such as baths and temples), and was used to organize military parades, the other side connected to an area where the Vatican is now that had some large houses.

“It was always good to connect the two banks of the Tiber,” but “the Vatican area was mostly private estates until the Fire of 64,” Mary Boatwright, a professor emerita of classical studies at Duke University, told Live Science in an email. Boatwright noted that it wasn’t until the 130s A.D. that development picked up in the area. 

The bridge did, however, have some military and religious importance for Rome, Temple argued. “The Pons Neronianus was both strategically and symbolically important,” Temple told Live Science.

One side of the bridge was located near an area where Roman troops would assemble to march in a triumph (a politically and religiously significant victory parade) and was likely part of the parade route. “The precise route of this procession is uncertain but it seems probable that the Pons Neronianus [and any bridge that preceded it] served as the bridge crossing for this purpose,” Temple said.  

This bridge may also have been used to transport high-profile prisoners, Temple added, noting that the crossing may have been “used by St. Peter when he was taken in chains” after his trial to the Vaticanus, where he was crucified in around A.D. 64, Temple said. 

“The Pons Neronianus has potentially a double significance, as the crossing point into Rome of triumphal armies, and in the opposite direction for St. Peter’s journey to the site of the crucifixion,” Temple said. 

Depending on how climate change affects the Tiber’s water levels, it’s possible that the remains of the bridge may become visible more often. It probably will be visible more often, Boatwright said, adding that “I’d personally rather it be submerged, and Italy not be threatened with drought.”