All posts by Archaeology World Team

EUROPE, TURKEY, WORLD

Cats and babies: Thousand-year-old mummies in Turkey’s Aksaray

Cats and babies: Thousand-year-old mummies in Turkey’s Aksaray

Cat, baby and adult mummies in Aksaray, the gateway to Cappadocia with its historical cultural riches and known as the first settlement of Central Anatolia, have been enchanting visitors at a museum where they are on display.

Cats and babies: Thousand-year-old mummies in Turkey’s Aksaray
Mummies of babies are displayed at the Aksaray Museum, in Aksaray, Turkey, on March 27, 2022.

At the Aksaray Museum, which houses Turkey’s first and only mummy section, there stands on display a total of 13 mummies, consisting of cats, babies and adult humans from the 10th, 11th and 12th centuries unearthed in excavations in and around Aksaray.

Aksaray Museum Director Yusuf Altın provided information on the mummies, which are preserved in showcases with special heating and cooling systems.

“With 13 mummies in our Aksaray Museum, we are the only museum in Turkey with a mummy section,” Altın said. “There is one mummy in each of the Amasya and Niğde Museums, but our museum has the only section exhibited in this way … in our country.”

“The mummies in our museum were found as a result of the excavations in the churches in Ihlara Valley. Some of our mummies were found in the churches built about a thousand years ago in Çanlı Church,” he stated.

A mummy of a cat is displayed at the Aksaray Museum, in Aksaray, Turkey, on March 27, 2022.

Altın pointed out that the embalming technique in Turkey was different compared to Egypt.

“Of these mummies, the baby mummy is very technical work in itself. Because the mummification technique in our country is different from the mummification technique in Egypt.

In this technique, after the person dies, the internal organs of the corpse are removed, the wax is melted and the corpse is covered with a layer of glaze. Then it is covered with fabric and shroud.

It is buried in the ground in this way and the corpse remains preserved for centuries after it dries. We bring our mummies from these excavations to our museum and exhibit them. In particular, we also exhibit the embroideries of necklaces, booties and shrouds on them.”

Yusuf stated that a cat loved by its owner was also preserved with the mummification technique and that a cat mummy was found during the excavation efforts.

“We have another mummy, the cat mummy, which especially attracts the attention of our children.

Our cat mummy was covered with wax and preserved, probably because it was loved by its owner. So, we have been displaying it in our museum,” he said.

“All of our mummies are from the 10th, 11th and 12th centuries. So, they are almost a thousand years old.”

PERU, SOUTH AMERICA, WORLD

1,000-Year-Old Gold Mask Found in Tomb Was Painted With Human Blood

1,000-Year-Old Gold Mask Found in Tomb Was Painted With Human Blood

A 1,000-year-old mask discovered on the head of an ancient skeleton was painted using human blood, according to a new study.

(Image credit: Adapted from Journal of Proteome Research 2021, DOI: 10.1021/acs.jproteome.1c00472)

Archaeologists with the Sicán Archaeological Project unearthed the gold mask in the early 1990s while excavating an ancient tomb in Peru. The tomb, which dates to around A.D. 1000, belonged to a middle-aged elite man from the ancient Sicán culture, which inhabited the northern coast of Peru from the ninth to the 14th centuries.

The skeleton, which was also painted in bright red, was discovered sitting headless and upside down at the centre of a square burial that was 39 feet (12 meters) deep. 

The head, which was intentionally detached from the skeleton, was placed right side up and was covered with the red-painted mask. Inside the tomb, archaeologists discovered 1.2 tons (1.1 metric tons) of grave goods and the skeletons of four others: two young women arranged into positions of a midwife and a woman giving birth, and two crouching children arranged at a higher level.

At the time of the excavation, scientists identified the red pigment on the mask as cinnabar, a bright-red mineral made of mercury and sulfur.

1,000-Year-Old Gold Mask Found in Tomb Was Painted With Human Blood
A Sicán funerary mask at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is similar to the one recently analyzed by archaeologists.

But despite being buried deep underground for a thousand years, somehow the red paint — a thick, 0.04- to-0.08-inch (1 to 2 millimetres) layer — had managed to remain attached to the mask. “The identity of the binding material, that had been so effective in the red paint, remained a mystery,” the authors wrote.

In the new study, the researchers analyzed a small sample of red paint to see if they could figure out the secret ingredient responsible for the effective binding. 

First, with an infrared spectroscopy technique that uses infrared light to identify components of a material, they figured out that proteins were present in the red paint.

They then used mass spectrometry, a method that can sort different ions in a material based on their charge and mass, to identify the specific proteins.

The red paint contained six proteins found in human blood, the researchers found. The paint also contained proteins originating from egg whites.

The proteins are highly degraded, so it’s unclear what bird species the eggs came from, but the researchers hypothesize that it may have been the Muscovy duck (Cairina moschata), according to a statement.

“Cinnabar-based paints were typically used in the context of social elites and ritually important items,” the authors wrote in the study. While cinnabar was restricted for elite use, non-elites used another type of ochre-based paint for painting objects, the authors wrote.  

Archaeologists had previously hypothesized that the skeletons’ arrangement represented a desired “rebirth” of the deceased Sicán leader, according to the statement. For this “desired” rebirth to take place, the ancients may have coated the entire skeleton in this bloody paint, possibly symbolizing red oxygenated blood or a “life force,” the authors wrote.

A recent analysis found that the Sicán sacrificed humans by cutting the neck and upper chest to maximize bleeding, the authors wrote. So “from an archaeological perspective, the use of human blood in the paint would not be surprising.”

The findings were published on Sept. 28 in the American Chemical Society’s Journal of Proteome Research.

EUROPE, TURKEY, WORLD

Farmer Finds 3,300-year-old Rare Hittite Bracelet in Field in Turkey

Farmer Finds 3,300-year-old Rare Hittite Bracelet in Field in Turkey

A man ploughing his farm in Turkey’s central Çorum province discovered a rare 3,300-year-old ancient bracelet from the Hittite era.

The farmer, who lives in the Çitli village of Mecitözü district, found the bracelet while he was working on the farm and brought the ancient treasure to the Çorum Museum.

Experts found out that the artefact is from the ancient Hittite civilization and carried out restoration work. They then recorded it in the museum’s inventory and put it in the collection.

The beautiful bracelet is made out of bronze, nickel, silver and gold and is adorned with depictions of Hittite symbols, including imagery of the Itar/Auka and his servants Ninatta and Kulitta.

Farmer Finds 3,300-year-old Rare Hittite Bracelet in Field in Turkey
The 3,500-year-old Hittite bracelet discovered by a Turkish farmer in Çorum, is on display at the Çorum Museum, March 27, 2022.

Resul Ibiş, an archaeologist at the museum, told Ihlas News Agency (IHA) that the bracelet has been put on display for visitors.

“After initial evaluations, we realized that this piece is unprecedented and we’ve never seen anything like this before,” he said, adding that it is from the 13th century B.C.

Ibiş also noted that the bracelet was deformed when it was brought to the museum and some of its pieces were missing, but they restored it.

The archaeologist also noted that there are very few pieces of Hittite-era jewellery and this piece sheds light on the jewellery styles of the civilization.

Çorum is home to the ancient Hittite city of Hattusa, one of the most significant tourist destinations in Turkey.

The Lion Gate is in the southwest part of the UNESCO Hattusa ruins, which are now a giant open-air archaeological park and one of Turkey’s most important tourist destinations.

It serves as an open-air museum with 6-kilometer-long (nearly 4-mile-long) city walls, monumental city gates, a 71-meter-long (78-yard-long) underground passage, the Hittites palace in Büyükkale, 31 unearthed temples and ancient wheat silos.

It was added to UNESCO’s World Heritage List in 1986 due to its well-protected architectural structures and excavation site.

It also has also held UNESCO’s title of “Memory of the World” since 2001 with its cuneiform scripts representing the oldest known form of Indo-European languages.

Hattusa served as the capital of the Hittite Empire, which was one of the civilizations that played an important role in the development of urban life, in the late Bronze Age. The capital was the first national excavation site in Turkey.

EUROPE, SCOTLAND, WORLD

Study Explores Mobility in Early Medieval Scotland

Study Explores Mobility in Early Medieval Scotland

Isotope analysis of ‘bodies in the bog’ found at Cramond reveals several crossed a politically divided Scotland, meeting their end hundreds of miles from their place of birth. For decades, the skeletal remains of nine adults and five infants found in the latrine of what was once a Roman bathhouse close to Edinburgh have fascinated archaeologists and the public alike.

Burial 1 – facial reconstruction of man who may have come from Loch Lomond
Dr Orsolya Czére with extracted bone collagen
Dr Orsolya Czére examines demineralised bone collagen during the extraction process

Discovered in Cramond in 1975 they were originally thought to be victims of the plague or a shipwreck from the 14th century. Then radiocarbon dating showed them to be some 800 years older, dating to the 6th century, or early medieval period. New bioarchaeological work led by the University of Aberdeen has brought to light more details of their lives and has revealed that several of the group travelled across Scotland to make Cramond their home.

Their investigations change our understanding not only of this important site but of the mobility and connections of people across Scotland in the early medieval period, when the country was broadly divided between the Scotti in Dál Riata to the west, the Picts in most of northern Scotland and the Britons in the south. The researchers examined the bones and teeth of the group unearthed from what was once the latrine of a bathhouse in a Roman fort, leading to them being coined ‘the bodies in the bog’.

Using isotope analyses they were able to look at the diet and origins of each of the adults in the group. Professor Kate Britton, the senior author of the study, said they were surprised to discover that despite being buried in close proximity to each other – leading to assumptions that they were one family – some were brought up hundreds of miles apart.

“Food and water consumed during life leave a specific signature in the body which can be traced back to their input source, evidencing diet and mobility patterns,” she added.

“Tooth enamel, particularly from teeth which form between around three and six years of age, act like little time capsules containing chemical information about where a person grew up.

“When we examined the remains, we found six of them to bear chemical signatures consistent with what we would expect from individuals growing up in the area local to Cramond but two – those of a man and a woman – were very different.

“This suggests that they spent their childhoods somewhere else, with the analysis of the female placing her origins on the West coast.”

“The male instead had an isotopic signature more typical of the Southern Uplands, Southern Highlands or Loch Lomond area so it is likely he came to Cramond from an inland area.”

Tooth enamel, particularly from teeth that form between around three and six years of age, act like little time capsules containing chemical information about where a person grew up.

~Professor Kate Britton

The findings, published in the Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences journal, provide one of the first insights into early medieval population mobility in Scotland.

Dr Orsolya Czére, post-doctoral researcher and lead author of the study, added: “This is a historically elusive time period, where little may be gleaned about the lives of individuals from primary literary sources. What we do know is that it was a politically and socially tumultuous time.

“In Scotland particularly, evidence is scarce and little is known about individual movement patterns and life histories. Bioarchaeological studies like this are key to providing information about personal movement in early medieval Scotland and beyond.

“It is often assumed that travel in this period would have been limited without roads like we have today and given the political divides of the time. The analysis of the burials from Cramond, along with other early medieval burial sites in Scotland, are revealing that it was not unusual to be buried far from where you had originally grown up.

“Previous studies have suggested that those buried here were of high social status, even nobility. What we can say from our new analyses was that these were well-connected individuals, with lives that brought them across the country”

“This is an important step in unravelling how these different populations of early medieval Scotland and Britain interacted.”

Despite evidence of geographical mobility, social tensions may still have been high. Several of the skeletons at Cramond indicate that some of the individuals may have met with violent ends.

Osteoarchaeologist and co-author Dr Ange Boyle from the University of Edinburgh said: “Detailed osteological analysis of the human remains has determined that a woman and young child deposited in the Roman latrine suffered violent deaths. Blows to the skulls inflicted by a blunt object, possibly the butt end of a spear would have been rapidly fatal. This evidence provides important confirmation that the period in question was characterised by a high level of violence.”

John Lawson, the City of Edinburgh Council archaeologist, co-author and lead archaeologist on the investigations at Cramond, says the new findings further underline the importance of the Cramond site.

“This paper has been the result of a fantastic collaboration between ourselves and our co-authors from Aberdeen and Edinburgh Universities. The final results from the isotopic research have confirmed the initial 2015 results giving us archaeological evidence and a window into the movement of elite society in the 6th century.

“In particular it is helping us to support our belief that Cramond during this time was one of Scotland’s key political centres during this important period of turmoil and origins for the state of Scotland. Whilst it has helped us answer some questions about the individuals buried in the former Roman Fort’s Bathhouse, it has also raised more. We hope to continue to work together to bring more findings to publication as these have a significant impact on what is known about the history of Scotland and Northern Britain during the Dark Ages.”

The study was funded by Edinburgh City Council and the University of Aberdeen and research by Professor Britton and Dr Czere is supported by the Leverhulme Trust and AHRC respectively.

ASIA, CHINA, WORLD

The first fossil of a daytime active owl found at the edge of the Tibetan Plateau

The first fossil of a daytime active owl found at the edge of the Tibetan Plateau

An amazingly well-preserved fossil skeleton of an extinct owl that lived more than six million years ago has been unearthed in China. The fossil was discovered nearly 7,000 feet (2,100 meters) up, in the Linxia Basin of China’s Gansu province, at the edge of the Tibetan Plateau.  

The first fossil of a daytime active owl found at the edge of the Tibetan Plateau
Fossil skeleton of the daytime active owl Miosurnia diurna from China (below) with an expanded view of the skull (top left). The eye bones or scleral ossicles are false-coloured blue and set in comparison with an intact ring in the skull of a pygmy owl Glaucidium (top right).

It dates back to the late Miocene Epoch, around six million years ago.

Detailed analysis of the skeleton’s fossilised eye bones by researchers at the Chinese Academy of Sciences reveals that, unlike most modern owls, this species was active in the daytime, not the night. 

The fossil comprises nearly the entire skeleton from the tip of the skull through the wings and legs to the tail bone, along with body parts that are rarely seen as fossils.

These include the bones of the tongue apparatus called the hyoid, the trachea, the kneecap, tendons for wing and leg muscles, and even the remnants of the last meal of a small mammal.

‘It is the amazing preservation of the bones of the eye in this fossil skull that allows us to see that this owl preferred the day and not the night,’ said Dr. LI, first author of the study.  

Reconstruction of the extinct owl Miosurnia diurna perched in a tree with its last meal of a small rodent, overlooking extinct three-toed horses and rhinos with the rising Tibetan Plateau on the horizon.

The researchers named the species Miosurnia diurna in reference to its close living relative, the diurnal Northern Hawk Owl (Surnia ulula). 

The features of the skull and skeleton, including a large bump on part of the cheekbone just behind the eye, show that Miosurnia is a part of the global owl group Surniini. 

Their research shows that the Surniini, which includes Miosurnia, the Northern Hawk Owl, and pygmy owls, rejected the night millions of years ago.

This extinct species is the first record of an ancient owl being ‘diurnal’, or active during the day.  Scleral ossicles are small bones that form a ring around the pupil and iris in the outer region of the eye.  Nocturnal animals require overall larger eyes and bigger pupils to see in low-light conditions, but diurnal animals have smaller eyes and pupils.

In the Miosurnia diurna fossil, the soft parts of the eye had decayed long ago, leaving the small trapezoidal scleral ossicles randomly collapsed into the owl’s eye socket. 

The palaeontologists, therefore, had to measure these individual small bones and do some basic geometry to rebuild the size and shape of the ring around the eye.

‘It was a bit like playing with Lego blocks, just digitally,’ said Dr. Stidham, describing how the 16 little similar bones overlap each other to form a ring around the iris and pupil. 

He said that putting them back together correctly allowed the scientists to determine the overall diameter of the ring and the opening for light in the middle.

The IVPP scientists then compared the fossil owl’s scleral ossicles with the eyes of 55 species of reptiles and more than 360 species of birds including many owls. 

Looking at the size and shape of the fossil’s eye and its relatively smaller opening for light, the scientists determined that it most resembles the eyes of living owls in the Surniini group. Furthermore, they studied behavioural data from over 360 species across a diversity of birds to determine which were likely nocturnal or diurnal.

Their results show that the ancestor of all living owls was almost certainly nocturnal, but the ancestor of the Surniini group was instead diurnal.

‘This fossil skeleton turns what we thought we knew about the evolution of owls on its head,’ said Dr. LI.

Dr. Stidham adds that Miosurnia diurnia is the first record of an evolutionary process spanning millions of years and stretching across the globe whereby owls evolved to ‘reject the night for some fun in the sun.’

The team’s findings were published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) on March 28.

ASIA, MONGOLIA, WORLD

Palaeolithic People in Mongolia May Have Consumed Giant Camel

Palaeolithic People in Mongolia May Have Consumed Giant Camel

A species of giant two-humped camel, Camelus knoblochi, is known to have lived for approximately a quarter of a million years in Central Asia. A new study in Frontiers in Earth Science shows that C. knoblochi’s last refuge was in Mongolia until approximately 27,000 years ago.

Palaeolithic People in Mongolia May Have Consumed Giant Camel

In Mongolia, the last of the species coexisted with anatomically modern humans and maybe the extinct Neanderthals or Denisovans. While the main cause of C. knoblochi’s extinction seems to have been climate change, hunting by archaic humans may also have played a role.

“Here we show that the extinct camel, Camelus knoblochi, persisted in Mongolia until climatic and environmental changes nudged it into extinction about 27,000 years ago,” said Dr. John W Olsen, Regents’ professor emeritus at the School of Anthropology of the University of Arizona, Tucson, US.

Paradoxically, today, southwestern Mongolia hosts one of the last two wild populations of the critically endangered wild Bactrian camel, C. ferus.

The new results suggest that C. knoblochi coexisted with C. ferus during the late Pleistocene in Mongolia, so that between-species competition may have been the third cause of C. knoblochi’s extinction. Standing nearly three meters tall and weighing more than a ton, C. knoblochi would have dwarfed C. ferus.

The precise taxonomic relationships between these two species, other extinct Camelus, and the ancient Paracamelus aren’t yet resolved.

Olsen said, “C. knoblochi fossil remains from Tsagaan Agui Cave [in the Gobi Altai Mountains of southwestern Mongolia], which also contains a rich, stratified sequence of human Paleolithic cultural material, suggest that archaic people coexisted and interacted there with C. knoblochi and elsewhere, contemporaneously, with the wild Bactrian camel.”

Steppe specialists are driven into extinction by desertification

The new study describes five C. knoblochi leg and foot bones found in Tsagaan Agui Cave in 2021, and one from Tugrug Shireet in today’s Gobi Desert of southern Mongolia. They were found in association with bones of wolves, cave hyenas, rhinoceroses, horses, wild donkeys, ibexes, wild sheep, and Mongolian gazelles. This assemblage indicates that C. knoblochi lived in montane and lowland steppe environments, less dry habitats than those of its modern relatives.

The authors conclude that C. knoblochi finally went extinct primarily because it was less tolerant of desertification than today’s camels, C. ferus, the domestic Bactrian camel C. bactrianus, and the domestic Arabian camel C. dromedarius.

In the late Pleistocene, much of Mongolia’s environment became drier and changed from steppe to dry steppe and finally desert.

“Apparently, C. knoblochi was poorly adapted to desert biomes, primarily because such landscapes could not support such large animals, but perhaps there were other reasons as well, related to the availability of fresh water and the ability of camels to store water within the body, poorly adapted mechanisms of thermoregulation, and competition from other members of the faunal community occupying the same trophic niche,” wrote the authors.

Towards the end, the last of the species may have lingered, at least seasonally, in the milder forest-steppe—grassland interspersed with woodland—further north in neighbouring Siberia. But this habitat probably wasn’t ideal either, which could have sounded the death knell for C. knoblochi. The world would not see giant camels again.

Preyed upon or scavenged by humans

What were the relations between archaic humans and C. knoblochi?

Corresponding author Dr. Arina M Khatsenovich, senior researcher at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Archeology and Ethnography in Novosibirsk, Russia, said, “A C. knoblochi metacarpal bone from Tsagaan Agui Cave, dated to between 59,000 and 44,000 years ago, exhibits traces of both butchery by humans and hyenas gnawing on it. This suggests that C. knoblochi was a species that Late Pleistocene humans in Mongolia could hunt or scavenge.”

“We don’t yet have sufficient material evidence regarding the interaction between humans and C. ferus in the Late Pleistocene, but it likely did not differ from human relationships with C. knoblochi—as prey, but not a target for domestication.”

First author Dr. Alexey Klementiev, a paleobiologist with the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Siberian Branch, said, “We conclude that C. knoblochi became extinct in Mongolia and in Asia, generally, by the end of Marine Isotope Stage 3 (roughly 27,000 years ago) as a result of climate changes that provoked degradation of the steppe ecosystem and intensified the process of aridification.”

ASIA, CHINA, WORLD

Neolithic Weapons Unearthed in Central China

Neolithic Weapons Unearthed in Central China

A dozen stone weapons have been unearthed from a site dating back between 3,800 to 4,200 years in central China’s Hunan Province, the provincial cultural relics and archaeology research institute said.

Neolithic Weapons Unearthed in Central China
An undated photo shows a large-scale platform foundation found at the Sunjiagang site in Lixian County, central China’s Hunan Province.

The Sunjiagang site, located northwest of Dongting Lake Plain, dates back to the late Neolithic Age to the early Xia Dynasty (around 2070-1600 BC). 

The stone weapons found at the Sunjiagang site in Lixian County include spears and arrows.

The relics indicate that the relationship between different communities in the area might have been relatively tense, and violent conflicts or wars occurred, said Zhao Yafeng, associate researcher with the institute.

Recent archaeological excavations also revealed a new form of residence at the Sunjiagang site, which is a simpler form of residential architecture. 

Zhao said the archaeological excavation and research at the site has greatly enriched the understanding of the prehistoric culture of the Liyang Plain and Dongting Lake area and provided new archaeological data for understanding the social life in the whole Dongting Lake area from the late Neolithic Age to the early Xia Dynasty.

EUROPE, SPAIN, WORLD

A 3,700-year-old burial site suggests female rule in Bronze Age Spain

A 3,700-year-old burial site suggests female rule in Bronze Age Spain

Archaeologists in Spain have determined that the 3,700-year-old remains of a woman found beneath a Bronze Age era ruin may well be the first case of an ancient female ruling elite in Western Europe.

3,700 Year Old Burial Chamber Of Canaanite Kings Discovered In Megiddo
View of the interior of La Almoloya grave 38.

The discovery at the La Almoloya site in Murcia, Spain, dates to around 1,700 B.C., according to newly published research in the British journal Antiquity.

The woman’s potential status as a ruler also means that the ruin her body was buried beneath is likely the first palace found in Western Europe dating from the Bronze Age, which lasted from about 3,200 -1,200 B.C.

The Almoloya site was first discovered in 1944 and is believed to be the cradle of the El Argar society, which flourished between 2,200 and 1,550 B.C. in the southeast part of what is now Spain.

They were one of the first societies in the region to use bronze, build cities, and erect monuments. El Argar is also considered to be an early example of a class-based state, with divisions in wealth and labour.

The woman’s remains, discovered in 2014, were buried with a man and several valuable objects, most notably a rare silver crown-like diadem on her head.

Further analysis of the remains and artefacts over the last few years led researchers to their conclusions about the significance of the find.

“These grave goods has allowed us to grasp the economic and political power of this individual and the dominant class to which they belonged,” researchers said in a press release.

The remains of the woman and man were found in a large jar located beneath the floor of a room. Researchers believe the woman was 25-30 years old and the man was 35-40 when they died around the same time in the mid-17th century B.C.

Genetic analysis indicates they had children together, including a daughter buried elsewhere on the site.

But it was the valuable objects, and the diadem, in particular, that suggested the political importance of the woman.

Also significant was the location of the remains beneath a room in a large building complex that seems to have had both residential and political functions, including a room with benches that could hold up to 50 people that researchers nicknamed the ‘parliament’.

This combination of residential and political use means the building meets the definition of a palace and would make it the first discovered that dates from the Bronze Age in Western Europe.

“The La Almoloya discoveries have revealed unexpected political dimensions of the highly stratified El Argar society,” the researchers said.

The building was destroyed by fire not long after the woman was interred, they said.