All posts by Archaeology World Team

MEXICO, NORTH AMERICA, WORLD

Archaeologists stunned by ancient ‘death mask’ found in Mexican temple

Archaeologists stunned by ancient ‘death mask’ found in Mexican temple

Palenque is set amid lush forest and dense foliage in a slice of southern Mexico. It is not the largest Mayan city by any stretch, but it has been described as one of the most stunning. Its architecture and the accompanying carvings and sculptures are some of the finest surviving pieces of Mayan history, in a region where the civilisation once thrived.

Compared to other Maya settlements in Mexico, Palenque was technically advanced.

A sophisticated aqua-duct system provided its inhabitants with abundant spring water — just one of the many perks of living there.

In the seventh century AD, the city was ruled by the powerful king, Pacal the Great.

He had one of the longest reigns of any Maya monarch, taking the throne in 615 at the age of just 12, and ruled until his death aged 80.

Archaeologists stunned by ancient 'death mask' found in Mexican temple
Archaeology: Researchers were stunned on finding the ancient ‘death mask’
Maya: The Maya were an ancient civilisation that resided in Mexico

While in power he oversaw the construction of some of Palenque’s jaw-dropping sacred sites like the huge Central Palace.

Perhaps most importantly, he commissioned the construction of the now-iconic Temple of the Inscriptions.

The temple and the work archaeologists have carried out in and around it was explored during the Smithsonian Channel’s documentary, ‘Sacred sites: Maya’.

In the mid-20th century, researchers discovered a relic that would give a “new insight” into what the Maya believed about the afterlife, according to the documentary’s narrator.

Palenque: While not the largest, Palenque is one of the best-preserved Maya cities

Excavating the temple floor, they uncovered a passage to a chamber deep within the pyramid.

It contained a sarcophagus covered by a stone lid — inside, lay the remains of an elite Mayan wearing a Jade “death mask”.

Hieroglyphs on the sarcophagus soon confirmed that the remains belonged to King Pacal, much to the surprise of the researchers.

This is because it meant that the temple housed the tomb of the great king himself. The narrator noted that while it is a place of burial, it is also “intended as a place of resurrection.”

Ancient history: Perfectly preserved carvings adorn many of the city’s walls and buildings
Pacal the Great: One of the Maya’s great kings left behind his intricately designed death mask

On the sarcophagus lid, the images illustrate a central Mayan belief that the Universe is made up of three levels: the Earth, the underworld and the heavens. Leaving this world, Pascal emerges from the underworld and is reborn into eternal life in the heavens in the engravings.

The narrator said: “This is the essence of Mayan religion.”

Later on, in 2018, archaeologists made yet another groundbreaking discovery at the site when they came across an ancient stucco mask unlike any other, thought to have been cast from Pacal’s face.

Unlike other artefacts found, however, it showed the king in old age, his wrinkles and other facial details clearly visible.

The 20-centimetre (7.8 inch) mask was found by a team with the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) during an investigation of the temple’s ancient drainage system.

Diego Prieto, director of the institute, said: “Palenque continues to astonish us with everything it has to offer archaeological, anthropological, and historical research.”

Ancient tomb: Pacal’s tomb was found deep inside a chamber within the temple

Ceramic figures were also found alongside the mask, as well as decorated bones and the remains of several animals.

Experts believe these were most likely offerings made for the completion of the building’s reconstruction. Palenque eventually perished in the eight century AD, and became consumed by the jungle of cedar, mahogany, and sapodilla trees.

ASIA, JAPAN, WORLD

Japan’s 1,000-year-old ‘killing stone’ said to contain an ancient demon cracked open

Japan’s 1,000-year-old ‘killing stone’ said to contain an ancient demon cracked open

According to the legend, the 1000-year-old killing stone trapped the spirit of a malevolent being. Now, due to rainwater, the rock has split open, sending believers into a state of frenzy.

The legend warns anyone who comes in contact with the stone will die. This volcanic rock, which is officially called Sessho-Seki, is rumoured to contain the mythical Tamomo-No-Mae, also known as the Nine-Tailed Fox.

Tamomo-No-Mae was an ancient demon from Japanese mythology that took the form of a beautiful woman.

The creature was storied to be a part of a plot to kill Emperor Toba, ruler of Japan from 1107 to 1123.

The volcanic rock is actually a popular tourist attraction, located in the mountainous northern region of Tochigi, near Tokyo.

The region is famous for its sulphurous hot springs.

Japan's 1,000-year-old 'killing stone' said to contain an ancient demon cracked open
Japan’s 1,000-year-old ‘killing stone’ said to contain an ancient demon cracked open

According to folklore, this killing stone earned its named by spewing poisonous gas at people.

However, since the rock cracked open, visitors have been fearful of approaching the site.

Some users online have even expressed fears the evil spirit has been unleashed once again.

Lily0727K, a user on Twitter, shared an image of the split rock, writing: “I came alone to Sesshoseki, where the legend of the nine-tailed fox remains.

The nine-tailed fox from Japanese mythology

“It was supposed to be, but the rock was split in half and the rope was also detached.

“If it’s a manga, it’s a pattern that the seal is broken and it’s possessed by the nine-tailed fox, and I feel like I’ve seen something that shouldn’t be seen.

“I’m getting really scared.”

According to local reports, the rock had actually begun cracking a couple of years ago. Most likely, rainwater seeped into the rock, degrading it over the years until it finally split open.

The rock was split open by rainwater

Local officials are now figuring out what to do with the rock’s remains and are looking into whether they could attempt to restore it. Others have commented on the split rock, saying: “Here I thought 2022 couldn’t get worse.

“Now a furious Japanese spirit is freed from its ‘killing stone’.”

But another joked: “My guess is the demon is going to look around at 2022 and want to go back into the rock for another millennium.”

The Japanese newspaper quoted a tourism official as saying he would like to see the Sessho-Seki restored to its original form.

Hopefully, the rumoured demon within the stone would be restored to its rocky prison as well. The killing stone was registered as a local historical site in 1957 and was also mentioned in Matsuo Basho’s The Narrow Road to the Deep North.

The site has inspired a Noh play, a novel and an anime film.

ENGLAND, EUROPE, WORLD

Roman mosaic and villa complex found in Rutland farmer’s field

Roman mosaic and villa complex found in Rutland farmer’s field

The team from the University of Leicester during the excavations of the Rutland villa’s mosaic floor.

It was a family ramble through fields during lockdown last year that led to an “oh wow moment”: the discovery of a Roman villa complex containing a rare mosaic depicting Homer’s The Iliad, now thought to be one of the most remarkable and significant finds of its kind in Britain.

Roman mosaic and villa complex found in Rutland farmer's field
The mosaic depicts scenes from Homer’s The Iliad, about the epic fight between Achilles and the Trojan hero, Hector.

The mosaic – the first example found in the UK displaying scenes from the Greek epic poem, and only one of a handful from across Europe – was found beneath a farmer’s field in Rutland.

It is now protected by the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) on the advice of Historic England.

Battles from the Trojan war were illustrated in only a handful of mosaics that have been found.

The site was discovered by Jim Irvine, son of the landowner, Brian Naylor, during the 2020 lockdown, and has been investigated by archaeologists from the University of Leicester in partnership with Historic England and Rutland county council.

Their investigation revealed the mosaic lies within an elaborate villa complex encompassing a host of other structures and buildings.

It is likely to have been occupied by a wealthy individual from the late Roman period, sometime between the 3rd and 4th century AD.

“A ramble through the fields with the family turned into an incredible discovery,” Irvine said. “Finding some unusual pottery among the wheat piqued my interest and prompted some further investigative work.

“Later, looking at the satellite imagery I spotted a very clear crop mark as if someone had drawn on my computer screen with a piece of chalk. This really was the ‘oh wow’ moment, and the beginning of the story.”

Human remains have been found at the site.

The remains of the mosaic measure 11m by almost 7m and form the floor of what is thought to be a large dining or entertaining area.

Though mosaics were used in a variety of private and public buildings across the Roman empire and often featured famous figures from history and mythology, there are only a handful of depictions of Achilles’ battle with Hector at the conclusion of the Trojan war.

The villa is surrounded by what appear to be aisled barns, circular structures and a possible bathhouse.

Human remains were also found in the rubble covering the mosaic, which was likely interred after the building was no longer occupied.

John Thomas, deputy director of the University of Leicester Archaeological Services and project manager on the excavations, called it “the most exciting Roman mosaic discovery in the UK in the last century”.

“It gives us fresh perspectives on the attitudes of people at the time, their links to classical literature,” he said. “This [the villa’s owner] is someone with a knowledge of the classics, who had the money to commission a piece of such detail, and it’s the very first depiction of these stories that we’ve ever found in Britain.”

Duncan Wilson, chief executive of Historic England, added that discoveries like this were “so important in helping us piece together our shared history”.

An aerial view of the archaeological site, photographed by drone.
SOUTH AMERICA, WORLD

How Old Is the Rock Art at La Lindosa?

How Old Is the Rock Art at La Lindosa?

More than 12,000 years ago, South America was teeming with an astonishing array of ice age beasts — giant ground sloths the size of a car, elephantine herbivores and a deerlike animal with an elongated snout.

These extinct giants are among many animals immortalized in an 8-mile-long (13-kilometer-long) frieze of rock paintings at Serranía de la Lindosa in the Colombian Amazon rainforest — art created by some of the earliest humans to live in the region, according to a new study.
“(The paintings) have the whole diversity of Amazonia.

Turtles and fishes to jaguars, monkeys and porcupines,” said study author Jose Iriarte, a professor in the Department of Archaeology at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom.

Iriate calls the frieze, which likely would have been painted over centuries, if not millennia, “the last journey,” as he said it represents the arrival of humans in South America — the last region to be colonized by Homo sapiens as they spread around the world from Africa, their place of origin. These pioneers from the north would have faced unknown animals in an unfamiliar landscape.

“They encountered these large-bodied mammals and they likely painted them. And while we don’t have the last word, these paintings are very naturalistic and we’re able to see morphological features of the animals,” he said.

But the discovery of what scientists term “extinct megafauna” among the dazzlingly detailed paintings is controversial and contested.

Other archaeologists say the exceptional preservation of the paintings suggest a much more recent origin and that there are other plausible candidates for the creatures depicted. For example, the giant ground sloth identified by Iriarte and his colleagues could in fact be a capybara — a giant rodent common today across the region.

The giant sloth painting at La Lindosa.

Final word?

While Iriarte concedes the new study is not the final word in this debate, he is confident that they have found evidence of early human encounters with some of the vanished giants of the past.

The team identified five such animals in the paper: a giant ground sloth with massive claws, a gomphothere (an elephant-like creature with a domed head, flared ears and a trunk), an extinct lineage of a horse with a thick neck, a camelid like a camel or a llama, and a three-toed ungulate, or hoofed mammal, with a trunk.

He said they are well known for fossilized skeletons, enabling palaeontologists to reconstruct what they must have looked like. Iriarte and his colleagues were then able to identify their defining features in the paintings.

While the red pigments used to make the rock art have not yet been directly dated, Iriarte said that ocher fragments found in layers of sediment during excavations of the ground beneath the painted vertical rock face dated to 12,600 years ago.

The camelid painting at the La Lindosa rock painting site in Colombia.

The hope is to directly date the red pigment used to paint the miles of rock, but dating rock art and cave paintings are notoriously tricky. Ocher, an inorganic mineral pigment that contains no carbon, can’t be dated using radiocarbon dating techniques.

The archaeologists are hoping the ancient artists mixed the ocher with some kind of binding agent that will allow them to get an accurate date. The results of this investigation are expected possibly later this year.

Further study of the paintings could shed light on why these giant animals went extinct. Iriarte said no bones of the extinct creatures were found during archaeological digs in the immediate area — suggesting perhaps they weren’t a source of food for the people who created the art.

The research was published in the journal Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society B on Monday.

ASIA, CHILE, WORLD

7,000-Year-Old Evidence of Geese Domestication Found in China

7,000-Year-Old Evidence of Geese Domestication Found in China

A team of researchers affiliated with multiple institutions in Japan and China has found evidence of goose domestication in China approximately 7,000 years ago.

Modern Chinese domestic geese (Anser cygnoides domesticus).

In their paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the group describes their study of goose bones found at Tianluoshan—a dig site in east China.

Over the past several years, scientists have debated the timeline of the domestication of birds—most have suggested that chickens, which are believed to have once been a type of junglefowl, were the first to be domesticated, though there is still much debate about when it first occurred.

Estimates have ranged from five to ten thousand years ago. In this new effort, the researchers have found evidence of the domestication of wild geese, as far back as 7,000 years ago.

The team found goose bones at the Tianluoshan site and used radiocarbon dating to find out how old they are.

They have also studied the bones in other ways to learn more about their characteristics, such as the age of the birds at death.

The bones were found at what had once been a settlement of stone-age people who were both hunter/gatherers and farmers—they grew rice to supplement their foraging efforts.

The researchers found 232 goose bones at the site, four of which were from goslings ranging from 8 to 16 weeks old.

They suggest this shows the birds were hatched near the site because it is believed that wild geese did not live in that area at the time the birds were alive.

They also found evidence suggesting that the birds had been locally bred based on chemicals in their bones that likely came from a local water source. And all of the adults were approximately the same size, which indicates captive breeding.

7,000-Year-Old Evidence of Geese Domestication Found in China
Goose bones were found at Tianluoshan, China.

The researchers suggest that the evidence they found provides strong evidence for the domestication of geese in China nearly 7,000 years ago.

A finding that could mean that geese were the first birds to be domesticated.

EUROPE, SPAIN, WORLD

Palaeontologists Unearth Dozens of Giant Dinosaur Eggs in Fossilized Nest in Spain

Paleontologists Unearth Dozens of Giant Dinosaur Eggs in Fossilized Nest in Spain

Archaeologists have extracted 30 titanosaur dinosaur eggs found in a two-ton rock in northern Spain and believe there could be as many as 70 deeper inside the boulder.

The titanosaur was a long-necked sauropod that lived until the extinction event at the end of the Cretaceous period 66 million years ago. The eggs were found at a dig site in Loarre in the northeastern Spanish province of Huesca in September.

Preliminary tests indicate that the nests belonged to the titanosaur, a quadruped herbivore with a long tail and neck that could reach up to 66 feet in length.

Paleontologists Unearth Dozens of Giant Dinosaur Eggs in Fossilized Nest in Spain
The first extracted titanosaur egg near Huesca in northern Spain.

An international team of palaeontologists led by the Aragosaurus-IUCA Group of the University of Zaragoza did the work in collaboration with Nova University Lisbon in Portugal.

Miguel Moreno-Azanz, Carmen Nunez-Lahuerta and Eduardo Puertolas are leading 25 palaeontologists and students from Spanish, Portuguese and German institutions in the project.

Moreno-Azanza, who is affiliated with Nova University Lisbon, said in an interview that two nests were excavated in 2020, and about 30 eggs have been discovered in the rock.

Carmen Nunez Lahuerta, a director of the excavation, works on a block containing a dinosaur nest near Huesca in northern Spain.

“The main objective of the 2021 campaign was the extraction of a large nest that contains at least 12 eggs that were integrated into a block of rock weighing over two tons,” he said. “In total, five people dedicated eight hours a day for 50 days to excavate the nest, which was finally removed with the help of a bulldozer.”

Moreno-Azanza pointed out that it was unusual to extract such a large rock. He said it and 10 smaller rocks from the site were now in a warehouse in Loarre and will eventually be displayed at the future Laboratory Museum.

Laura de Jorge and Cristina Sanz Ascaso prepare a 2-ton block for extraction in the discovered dinosaur nest near Huesca in northern Spain.

“It is expected that next spring the space will open its doors to visitors, who will be able to follow the process of preparing and studying the fossils of this site in person,” Moreno-Azanza said.

“The museum has two exhibition rooms where the methodology of a complex paleontological excavation will be explained.”

He said the exhibition would be a satellite room of the Museum of Natural Sciences of the University of Zaragoza and feature specimens from the Loarre site and replicas of dinosaur eggs from other parts of the world.

Moreno-Azanza also said the Loarre Dinosaur Eggs project has obtained funding for the next three years.

The excavation team poses at the site where the titanosaur eggs were found near Huesca in northern Spain.

The excavation work is being funded by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology and the Spanish Ministry of Science.

AFRICA, EGYPT, WORLD

Egypt breakthrough: How lost Tutankhamun artefact was found after ‘vanishing for decades’

Egypt breakthrough: How lost Tutankhamun artefact was found after ‘vanishing for decades’

Tutankhamun was an ancient Egyptian pharaoh who was the last of his royal family to rule at the end of the 19th Dynasty during the New Kingdom. Known as “the boy king,” he inherited the throne at just nine years old and mysteriously died less than a decade later, with his burial rushed and his legacy seemingly wiped, leading many to claim he was murdered. In 1922, Howard Carter discovered KV62 in the Valley of the Kings, jam-packed with the most luxurious collection of artefacts, along with Tutankhamun’s body.

Now, almost a century later, an item that was thought to have been lost or stolen has reemerged thanks to the construction of a new museum, Channel 5’s “Secrets of Egypt’s Valley of the Kings” revealed.

The narrator said in March: “300 miles north of the valley in Giza, in the shadow of the pyramids, the magnificent treasures found in Tutankhamun’s tomb are getting a new home.

“British archaeologist Howard Carter found over 5,000 artefacts and set the standard for modern archaeology by spending years meticulously cataloguing them.

“However, the huge collection ended up scattered in locations across Egypt. 

Egypt breakthrough: How lost Tutankhamun artefact was found after 'vanishing for decades'
The artefact was buried with Tutankhamun
The team were packing up boxes to move to the new museum

“This £700million museum and research centre will reunite the collection for the first tie in a century.

“Now, in the new museum’s labs, scientists and Egyptologists use modern technology to study and analyse each artefact.”

The series went on to describe how one of Mr Carter’s original boxes was uncovered.

It added: “But some of Tut’s greatest treasures are yet to arrive.

“300 miles south in Luxor, Eissa Zidan is preparing 122 of Tut’s artefacts for their move to Giza.

The archaeologists uncovered a box

“But a few hours into the packing, Eissa gets some unexpected news. 

“During the move, the team have unearthed one of the original boxes Howard Carter used to transport Tut’s treasures out of the tomb.

“It was hidden in the corner of a storeroom and it’s been lost for decades.”

Inside the box, archaeologists found an amazing piece of history. The narrator explained: “These delicate wooden pieces are ancient boat parts and belong to one of the model boats that Howard Carter found in Tutankhamun’s tomb.

Inside was a model boat
What Howard Carter saw when he opened KV62

“The idea of eternal life was essential to ancient Egyptians as it is to major religions today.

“They believed the deceased would begin the journey by boat, so model boats were precious grave goods.

“The vessels often came complete with crew, because it was believed the replicas would come to life and help with fishing and transport in the afterlife.”

The afterlife was essential to ancient Egyptians and the goods they were buried with were said to be a key part of the journey.

The series continued: “The pharaohs used a special vessel to sail across the sky for eternity. 

“Ordinary people also thought they could reach the afterlife by boat, rowing up the Nile on these models and into the next world.

“Records show that the box was sent to Luxor in 1973, but had gone missing, presumed lost or stolen.

“The mast and the boat must have become separated decades ago.”

The discovery came before the opening of the new exhibition in London: “Tutankhamun: Treasures of the Golden Pharaoh.” More than 150 artefacts have travelled from Egypt to the Saatchi Gallery and will be on display now until May 3, 2020.  

For the first time ever, 60 items have left the country, before they return to their permanent home in the new Grand Egyptian Museum next year.   Recently closed in Paris, the exhibition became France’s most visited of all time with an attendance of over 1.4 million.

ENGLAND, EUROPE, WORLD

Archaeologists stunned as ‘Britain’s most exciting’ mystery solved after 4,000 years

Archaeologists stunned as ‘Britain’s most exciting’ mystery solved after 4,000 years

In 2004, Wessex Archaeologists Ltd were called in by architects to excavate land at Cliffs End Farm prior to building a new housing development.

Suspicions were heightened after earlier investigations showed that the site had been occupied during the early and late Bronze Age, between 2,400BC and 700BC and again in the early Saxon period of 400AD to 600AD.

But what archaeologists found came to be dubbed “Britain’s most exciting historical discovery,” as numerous deposits of human remains were found alongside near-complete carcasses of animals in what was believed to be ritual burials.

Now, more than a decade later, archaeologist Tori Herridge pieced together the exact contents of these mass graves during Channel 4’s “Bone Detectives” series.

She said during Saturday’s show: “It’s hard to believe, but beneath this estate lies one of Britain’s most exciting historical discoveries. 

“Back in 2004, when these houses were still drawings on an architect’s plan and this whole area was a farmer’s field, archaeologists were called in.

“What they found was an extraordinary complex of structures, a deep oval-shaped pit and a disturbing collection of bones, human bones.

Archaeologists stunned as ‘Britain’s most exciting’ mystery solved after 4,000 years
The discovery was made in Cliffsend
A housing development now stands on top

“But who were these people and what happened to them?”

Dr Herridge went on to detail more specifics.

She added: “They were excavated, specifically this northeastern corner here in a place called the Isle of Thanet, but not an island today, I hasten to add.

“They were around here between Ramsgate and Sandwich, that’s where they were excavating.”

Dr Herridge then took viewers to look at one skeleton in specific, before asking osteoarchaeologist Jackie McKinley to explain what she had discovered.

Tori Herridge is investigating

Dr McKinley said: “This is from the Late Bronze Age, so it’s ninth to 11th century BC, 3,000 years ago.

“We have 23 individuals in total from this site, most of them were adults.

“We have rather more females than males, overall 12 females to eight males (three unidentified).

“The really interesting ones were the six in situ ones that were associated with the pit, five of which were in the base and this was one of those.”

Dr Herridge explained why this skeleton stuck out to experts the most.

Some of the remains gave an insight
One skeleton showed a skull had been stabbed several times

She added: “This is the eldest of the individuals that we had, she was the primary deposit, the first to be deposited in the base of this pit and buried there.

“She was certainly over 55 years of age, it’s quite difficult to age people when they get to that kind of age because you are going on degenerative processes.

“If you look at this one, this is the neck vertebrae and you can see the breakdown in the surface, you’ve got pitting, you’ve got little holes and new bone around the edges.

“This level of wear really shows a very old individual this has happened to.

“If you look up here you can see this incredible amount of wear to the teeth, all the enamel has worn away, so that’s telling me she was very old.”

However, the discovery also apparently proved the people had not been murdered, contrary to original theories.

Dr Herridge continued: “Usually we can’t tell what people die of, there aren’t many acute diseases that affect the bone, but in this instance, I know exactly how she died.

“For that, we just need to look at the skull, she’s been killed quite violently with a sword.”

But even stranger, strontium and oxygen isotope analyses revealed evidence for a mixture of people from the Western Mediterranean, Scandinavia and locals from Kent in the assemblage. 

These long distances are made all the more remarkable as they were undertaken when some of the individuals were between the ages of three and 12.

The discovery suggests that Cliffsend was hugely important in Bronze Age Britain and held a very high spiritual importance to maintaining a strong civilisation.