All posts by Archaeology World Team

NORTH AMERICA, U.S.A, WORLD

Researchers Just Found The Deepest Shipwreck On Earth Four Miles Below The Pacific

Researchers Just Found The Deepest Shipwreck On Earth Four Miles Below The Pacific

A US-based team has thoroughly mapped and filmed the world’s deepest recorded shipwreck, a World War II US Navy destroyer. In the Philippine Sea, the USS Johnston is at a depth of 21,180 feet (about 6,500 meters). While its existence has long been established, this is the first time a crew has been able to map and film the entire wreckage.

The USS Johnson, pictured here in 1943.

Caladan Oceanic, a US-based private company that focuses on ocean expeditions, gets credit for reaching the shipwreck on March 31. Its research vessel, the DSV Limiting Factor, was able to survey the wreck, which was more than 100 feet deeper than previously believed, sitting in the darkness more than four miles below the surface of the Pacific.

Caladan Oceanic’s founder is Victor Vescovo, a former US Navy commander who has a long-established passion for visiting some of the world’s most hard-to-get-to places. He holds the record for being the first person in history to have been to the top of all the world’s continents, both poles, and the bottom of all its oceans.

With the survey of the USS Johnston, Vescovo reached another milestone — completing the deepest shipwreck dive in history. He was at the controls of the Limiting Factor for the whole process, which took place in two eight-hour segments over two days.

Sunk during the Battle off Samar.

The USS Johnston was sunk by the Japanese navy on October 25, 1944, during the Battle off Samar. It was one of four naval battles which comprised the Battle of Leyte Gulf, one of the largest battles in the history of naval warfare and engagement that sounded the death knell of the Japanese navy in World War II, according to the US Naval History and Heritage Command (NHHC).

Sam Cox, director of the NHHC, said the new images of the wreck of the Johnston help the Navy put the spotlight on the heroism and history of its crew.

Researchers Just Found The Deepest Shipwreck On Earth Four Miles Below The Pacific
The ship was named after Lieutenant John V. Johnston, a Civil War hero.

The Johnston was captained by Cmdr. Ernest Evans, a Native American from Oklahoma. Along with two other US destroyers and four smaller destroyer escorts, Evans led the Johnston in attacking a far superior Japanese force of four battleships, six heavy cruisers, two light cruisers, and 11 destroyers, according to the NHHC account of the battle.

In an initial encounter, fire from the Johnston knocked out a Japanese cruiser, but the US destroyer was heavily damaged and its ammunition depleted. Evans himself was seriously wounded.

Undaunted, Evans regrouped his crew and the Johnston attacked the Japanese ships again, drawing their fire from a nearby US aircraft carrier.

After two-and-a-half hours of fighting, the Johnston was without power and surrounded by Japanese ships. Evans ordered the crew to abandon the ship, and it rolled over and sank.

Researchers believe they found the wreckage of the USS Johnston World War II era destroyer at a depth of 20,400 feet under the Philippine Sea.

Two of the three ships that followed the Johnston into the Japanese battle line were also sunk, said Carl Schuster, a former Navy captain and Hawaii Pacific University instructor.

“The discovery of the USS Johnston serves as yet another reminder of the heroism and sacrifice of that day in Leyte Gulf 77 years ago,” he said.

Of the Johnston’s crew of 327 men,186 died, including Evans. He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor, the first Native American in the US Navy to be awarded his country’s highest military honour, according to the NHHC.

For Vescovo, being able to reach the USS Johnston was a very personal mission.

“In some ways, we have come full circle,” he said in a statement. “The Johnston and our own ship were built in the same shipyard, and both served in the US Navy. As a US Navy officer, I’m proud to have helped bring clarity and closure to the Johnston, its crew, and the families of those who fell there.”

EUROPE, ROMANIA, WORLD

European Woman’s 35,000-Year-Old Genome Sequenced

European Woman’s 35,000-Year-Old Genome Sequenced

According to a statement released by Uppsala University, a team of researchers led by Mattias Jakobsson has sequenced the genome of a woman whose 35,000-year-old skull was discovered in southern Romania’s Peștera Muierri cave system in the 1950s.

For the first time, researchers have successfully sequenced the entire genome from the skull of Peştera Muierii 1, a woman who lived in today’s Romania 35,000 years ago.

Her high genetic diversity shows that the out of Africa migration was not the great bottleneck in human development but rather this occurred during and after the most recent Ice Age.

“She is a bit more like modern-day Europeans than the individuals in Europe 5,000 years earlier, but the difference is much less than we had thought.

We can see that she is not a direct ancestor of modern Europeans, but she is a predecessor of the hunter-gathers that lived in Europe until the end of the last Ice Age,” says Mattias Jakobsson, professor at the Department of Organismal Biology at Uppsala University and the head of the study.

Very few complete genomes older than 30,000 years have been sequenced. Now that the research team can read the entire genome from Peştera Muierii 1, they can see similarities with modern humans in Europe while also seeing that she is not a direct ancestor.

In previous studies, other researchers observed that the shape of her cranium has similarities with both modern humans and Neanderthals.

For this reason, they assumed that she had a greater fraction of Neanderthal ancestry than other contemporaries, making her stand out from the norm.

But the genetic analysis in the current study shows that she has the same low level of Neanderthal DNA as most other individuals living in her time. Compared with the remains of some individuals who lived 5,000 years earlier, such as Peştera Oase 1, she had only half as much Neanderthal ancestry.

The spread of modern humans out of Africa about 80,000 years ago is an important period in human history and is often described as a genetic bottleneck. Populations moved out of Africa and into Asia and Europe.

The effects of these migrations can be seen even today. Genetic diversity is lower in populations outside of Africa than in African. That Peştera Muierii 1 has high genetic diversity implies that the greatest loss of genetic diversity occurred during the last Ice Age (which ended about 10,000 years ago) instead of during the out of Africa migration.

“This is exciting since it teaches us more about the early population history of Europe. Peştera Muierii 1 has much more genetic diversity than expected for Europe at this time.

This shows that genetic variation outside of Africa was considerable until the last Ice Age and that the Ice Age caused the decrease in diversity in humans outside of Africa.”

The researchers were also able to follow the genetic variation in Europe over the last 35,000 years and see a clear decrease in variations during the last Ice Age.

The reduced genetic diversity has previously been linked to pathogenic variants in genomes being more common among populations outside of Africa, but this is in dispute.

“Access to advanced medical genomics has allowed us to study these ancient remains and even be able to look for genetic diseases. To our surprise, we did not find any differences during the last 35,000 years, even though some individuals alive during the Ice Age had low genetic diversity.

Now we have accessed everything possible from these remains. Peştera Muierii 1 is important from a cultural history perspective and will certainly remain interesting for researchers within other areas, but from a genetic perspective, all the data is now available.”

Fact Peştera Muierii

Peştera Muierii 1 is the name given to one of the three individuals whose remains were found in a cave of the same name. Peştera Muierii (roughly translates to women’s cave) is the name of a cave system in Baia de Fier in southern Romania. It is best known for the remains of cave bears and for the 1950s discovery of skulls and other skeletal parts from three females that lived about 35,000 to 40,000 years ago.

DENMARK, EUROPE, WORLD

Viking Burials Surveyed on Danish Island

Viking Burials Surveyed on Danish Island

According to a statement released by Flinders University, a team of researchers from Flinders University and Wessex Archaeology surveyed Kalvestene, a Viking burial site on the Danish island of Hjarnø, and compared their findings with a map made in the seventeenth century by the antiquarian Ole Worm.

As part of the first survey since the National Museum of Denmark discovered and restored 10 tombs on a small island off the eastern coast almost a century ago.

The burial site is made up of monuments which, according to legend, commemorate a king named Hiarni who was crowned after writing a beautiful poem on the death of the old king and who was defeated in battle on the island.

The research, published today in The Journal of Island and Coastal Archaeology (UICA), shows the design of the famous Kalvestene grave field is unusual when compared to other Danish sites of the same period which typically incorporate circle, oval or triangle stone settings in addition to the ship shaped settings. Instead, there are strong parallels with Southern Swedish sites, raising questions about links between the two regions.

Ole Worm’s 1650 drawings showed more than 20 ship settings at the location, and while data collected by the researchers suggests that there were probably never as many ship settings as that, it is possible that they have identified two new ship settings.

“Our survey identified two new raised areas that could in fact be ship settings that align with Worm’s drawings from 1650. One appears to be a typical ship setting and the second remains ambiguous but it’s impossible to know without excavation and further survey,” says lead author Dr Erin Sebo at Flinders University.

The paper, The Kalvestene: a re-evaluation of the ship settings on the Danish Island of Hjarnø, was co-authored by archaeologists from Flinders University in Australia including Dr Erin Sebo, Chelsea Wiseman, Dr John McCarthy, Dr Katarina Jerbić and Associate Professor Jonathan Benjamin with geophysicist Paul Baggaley from Wessex Archaeology.

“It seems surprising that such a small grave field would be famous and yet the existence of the site was well known in medieval Scandinavia. The island was famous probably because ships would have to sail past to reach a trading centre at Horsens and artefacts from a hoard excavated by Dr Mads Ravn and his team from the Vejle Museum in 2017 suggest the island was visited by foreign traders.”

Viking Burials Surveyed on Danish Island

The ship settings are today interpreted as a religious symbol of the Vikings connection to Norse mythology and the god Njord. His symbol, a ship or Skidbladnir controlled wind and weather so the Vikings paid tribute to him for good sailing conditions.

The researchers analysed medieval records, aerial photogrammetric and LiDAR data collected by the Moesgaard Museum to reveal why Hjarnø is unique in terms of its construction after being adapted to the specific conditions of the small island community.

“An archaeological survey was undertaken in 2018 to record the features of the ship settings and their position in the coastal landscape at Hjarnø,” says Associate Professor Jonathan Benjamin who is the Maritime Archaeology Program Coordinator at Flinders University’s College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences.

“Each stone was measured and drawn alongside data we acquired through low altitude photography to provide the landscape, in conjunction with sonar surveying in waters near the Viking site, to check for culturally significant material but no indications of this were located during the survey.”

“While this study is unable to offer a conclusive understanding of the origins of the Kalvestene, it demonstrates the value of combining source criticism and analysis with archaeological data to contribute towards greater understanding about the site.”

EUROPE, NETHERLANDS, WORLD

6,000-year-old baby found cradled in mother’s arm

6,000-year-old baby found cradled in mother’s arm

A 6,000-year-old baby with its teeth still intact and resting in the arms of a woman, believed to be its mother, has been found in a grave in the Netherlands.

The grave dates back to the Stone Age and is thought to be around 6,000 years old

Archaeologists said it was the oldest baby grave ever found in the Netherlands. The grave, uncovered at a site in Nieuwegein in the province of Utrecht, dates back to the Stone Age.

The discovery only came to light after four exhumed skeletons were examined by archaeological consultancy RAAP in Leiden.

Scientists noticed that the right arm of the 30-year-old woman’s skeleton was bent at a strange angle. It was crooked instead of straight – the usual posture of other skeletons at the site.

Closer inspection showed bone fragments of an infant by her arm and revealed that the woman was buried cradling a baby.

“The posture of the woman’s body did not conform to what we had found so far, that is, bodies whose limbs are placed parallel to the body. We then made the moving discovery that she was in fact cradling a little baby,” project leader Helle Molthof told Dutch broadcaster NOS.

6,000-year-old baby found cradled in mother’s arm
Left: The baby was found tucked under its mother’s arm in a grave in Nieuwegein, the Netherlands

The bone fragments sent for analysis included a tiny jaw holding several baby teeth. From this, scientists concluded that the infant had died when it was just a couple of months old.

“It really makes an impression when you find little baby teeth buried in clay for 6,000 years and see how similar they are to all those milk teeth that are kept in matchboxes by parents everywhere,” Molthof said.

DNA tests will reveal whether the woman was the infant’s mother as well as the sex of the baby.

Archaeologists hope that the grave will inform them about the burial ceremonies of the hunter-gatherer communities who lived along the banks of the River Vecht.

“We know how they lived, what sort of food they ate, what their houses were like but we don’t know very much yet about how they buried their dead and what happened to the children,” Molthof said.

ASIA, EUROPE, RUSSIA, WORLD

Till death do us part! 3500-year-old tombs with hand-holding couples found

Till death do us part! 3500-year-old tombs with hand-holding couples found

Russian scientists are trying to uncover the secrets of 3,500-year-old Bronze Age graves, where couples are buried together in a seemingly loving embrace – under suspicions of macabre explanation.

These pictures show ancient burials in the village of Staryi Tartas in Siberia where some 600 tombs were examined by experts.

Dozens contain the bones of couples, some with male and female skeletons, facing each other and their hands appear to be held together forever.

Russian scientists have uncovered the bones of dozens of couples buried facing each other in Staryi Tartas village in Siberia

The Siberian Times said: ‘Archeologists are struggling for explanation and hope that DNA testing can provide answers for these remarkable burials.’ One writer, Vasiliy Labetskiy, described the scenes in the graves poignantly as skeletons in ‘post-mortal hugs with bony hands clasped together.

One theory is that these Andronovo burials show the start of the nuclear family, but another version that after the man died, his wife was killed and buried with him.

Still, another suggests that some of the couples were deliberately buried as if in a sexual act, possibly with a young woman sacrificed to play this role in the grave. Other graves at the site in the Novosibirsk region in western Siberia show adults buried with children.

Professor Vyacheslav Molodin, director of research of the Institute of Archeology and Ethnography of the Siberian branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, said: ‘We can fantasise a lot about all this.

‘We can allege that husband died and the wife was killed to be interred with him as we see in some Scythian burials, or maybe the grave stood open for some time and they buried the other person or persons later, or maybe it was really simultaneous death.

‘When we speak about a child and an adult, it looks more natural and understandable.

Some graves at the site in Novosibirsk region in western Siberia show adults buried with children

‘When we speak about two adults – it is not so obvious. So we can raise quite a variety of hypotheses, but how it was in fact, we do not know yet.’

Work is underway to establish the ‘kinship’ of these ancient couple burials using DNA research.

‘For example, we found the burial of a man and a child. What is the degree of their kinship? Are they father and son or…? The same question arises when we found a woman and a child. It should seem obvious – she is the mother. But it may not be so. She could be an aunt or not a relative at all. To speak about this scientifically we need the tools of paleogenetics.

One writer described the scenes in the graves poignantly as skeletons in ‘post-mortal hugs with bony hands clasped together’
Work is underway to establish the ‘kinship’ of these ancient couple burials using DNA research

‘We have a joint laboratory with the Institute of Cytology and Genetics, of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Science,  and we actively work in this direction. We do such analysis but it is quite expensive still and there are few specialists. We are also solving other questions with help of paleogenetics.’

With such couple burials, Professor Lev Klein, of St Petersburg State University, has proposed they are linked to reincarnation beliefs possibly influenced by Deeksha rituals in the ancient Indian sub-continent at the time when the oldest scriptures of Hinduism were composed.

‘The man during his lifetime donated his body as a sacrifice to all the gods,’ he wrote. ‘The ‘Deeksha was considered as a “second birth” and to complete this ritual the sacrificing one made a ritual sexual act of conceiving.’ In other words, in death, a man should perform a sexual act to impregnate a woman.

‘Perhaps in the pre-Vedic period relatives of the deceased often sought to reproduce the “Deeksha” posthumously, and sacrificed a woman or a girl (or a few), and simulated sexual intercourse in the grave,’ he said.

Archeologists are struggling for explanations and believe DNA tests will provide the answers to these remarkable burials, it was reported

Professor Molodin doesn’t rule out this version, yet makes clear it is only a hypothesis that needs more study.

‘It is again a suggestion. As a suggestion, it could be. This idea of Klein can be extended to Siberia too because a significant part of the researchers think that Andronovo people were Iranians.

‘So this hypothesis can be extended to them. But, I will repeat, it is only a hypothesis.’

ASIA, CHINA, WORLD

Ancient Chinese tomb dating back 2,500 years uncovered to shed light on the obscure kingdom

Ancient Chinese tomb dating back 2,500 years uncovered to shed light on obscure kingdom

Archaeologists in Luoyang, central China, unveiled a 2,500-year-old tomb they’ve been excavating since 2009.

The tomb contained copper bells and ceremonial pots. It is the largest site of around 200 tombs in the area. There was also a horse burial pit that contained whole horse skeletons and chariots.

Experts believe that the burial site belongs to a nobleman or royal of a little-known kingdom, called Lukun, that only existed between 638 BC to 525 BC, reported People’s Daily Online.

Ancient Chinese tomb dating back 2,500 years uncovered to shed light on obscure kingdom
Archaeologists found a horse burial pit in Luoyang, China which contained several whole skeletons and chariots
The area had ground water damage, which needed to be pumped out (above), but it was still well preserved despite the damage

The local government has been excavating in the Yinchuan area, just south of Luoyang city, since 2009 after a spate of grave robberies. An initial survey of the area revealed around 200 rectangular gravesites, eight horse and carriage burial pits, 30 storage pits and 10 kilns.

The largest site had a tomb that around approximately three feet below ground. It measured 21 feet long, 17 feet wide and 28 feet deep.

Due to groundwater in the area, the exterior of the tomb already has visible water damage. There were also signs of damage as a result of grave robbery. 

However, the interior coffin was protected by plaster and coffin board. It was in the space between the plaster and the coffin board that the copper wares were discovered.

The relics from the tomb have yet to be catalogued but they showed influences from the neighbouring regions at the time

The full count of the relic has yet to be completed but owing to its size, experts believe that the site was for a noble family, which didn’t have great political power.

At a nearby site, excavation of a horse burial site has been carried out since 2013. In a pit that measured 25 feet long, 20 feet wide and nine feet deep, a total of 13 horses and six chariots were found.

The horses had been neatly arranged and were left on their side. They even had decorative items on top. In a corner of the pit, there were also large quantities of cow and sheep heads and hooves.

Experts believe that the shape of the items belonged to a kingdom called Luhun, which existed between 638 BC to 525 BC. It had been detailed in historic texts but little was known about the kingdom since it only lasted for a short time.

The horses carried intricate adornments on them (pictured), giving archaeologists clues to the period that the tombs were built
Cow and sheep’s heads and hoofs were also found in the burial site, which was said to be a Luhun Kingdom tradition at the time
Experts hope the site will help them uncover and track the movements of the ethnic minority groups in the area during that time

Experts now believe that the burial showed evidence of the Luhun people’s migration.

The Rong people, an ethnic minority group who made up the population of the kingdom, had a tradition of burying the cattle parts in the horse burial pits, which was not seen in other burial sites of the same period. 

However, the designs of the objects that were buried also showed the stylistic influence from the surrounding regions during the Spring-Autumn period (722 BC to 481 BC).

This showed that the country had absorbed influences from its surroundings and combined them with its own traditions.

It is now hoped that the site will help historians and archaeologists uncover the movements of the ethnic minority groups in the area.  

EUROPE, TURKEY, WORLD

Turkish archaeologists find 2,400-year-old monument at Haydarpaşa

Turkish archaeologists find 2,400-year-old monument at Haydarpaşa

Hurriyet Daily News reports that a semicircular structure dated to the third century B.C. has been uncovered at the site of the Haydarpașa train station in Istanbul, which is located on the Asian side of the Bosporus. 

Apse Dated to Third Century B.C. Uncovered in Istanbul

The structure, discovered at the station’s waiting platforms, covers a large area and is apsidal in form, a feature common in ancient churches.

These remains give significant hints about Khalkedon, the ancient ‘Land of the Blind’ from some 2,500 years ago.

While the site’s architecture does not lend any clues to its function, archaeologists believe it was considered sacred.

However, they also estimate that the building is the oldest architectural structure unearthed in these excavations.

Speaking to Demirören News Agency, Mehmet Ali Polat, Chief archaeologist of the Haydarpaşa excavation, gave information about the field works and finds.

Remains were found in an area of 350,000 square meters, including the area surrounding the station, said Polat, adding that small finds, pots, coins dating from around 6 B.C. to the modern-day were found, all from various eras.

“This is the northwestern port of the ancient city of Khalkedon, a large structure that could be a warehouse. On the other side of the road, we see a group of buildings that could be a small summer palace,” Polat said.

The Haydarpaşa Train Station was shut down for restorations, in which ancient artefacts were unearthed, and since then, Haydarpaşa has been an excavation site.

The digs, started in 2018 by Turkey’s Culture and Tourism Ministry and Istanbul Archeological Museums, have been done with the utmost care for the last three years.

Digs revealing historical structures shed light on the deep roots of Anatolia and Istanbul, a cradle of civilizations.

ASIA, EUROPE, RUSSIA, WORLD

2,000-year-old remains of nomadic ‘royal’ unearthed by Russian farmer includes ‘laughing man,’ haul of jewels and weapons

2,000-year-old remains of nomadic ‘royal’ unearthed by Russian farmer includes ‘laughing man,’ haul of jewels and weapons

Russian farmer unearths the remains of a 2,000-year-old nomadic ‘royal’ buried alongside a ‘laughing’ man. A farmer found the haul when digging on his land in the south of Russia near the Caspian Sea.

Stunning gold and silver jewellery, weaponry, valuables and artistic household items were found next to the chieftain’s skeleton in a grave close to the Caspian Sea in southern Russia. Local farmer Rustam Mudayev’s spade made an unusual noise and it emerged he had struck an ancient bronze pot near his village of Nikolskoye in the Astrakhan region.

A chieftain was buried with his head raised as if on a pillow (pictured). It is believed the individual was a high-ranking ‘royal’ of a nomadic society more videos He took it to the Astrakhan History museum for analysis and an experts opinion on the find.

A skeleton uncovered by researchers in Russia.

‘As soon as the snow melted we organised an expedition to the village,’ said museum’s scientific researcher Georgy Stukalov.’After inspecting the burial site we understood that it to be a royal mound, one of the sites where ancient nomads buried their nobility.’

WERE THE SARMARTIANS? 

The Sarmatians were a group of people who lived for almost a millennium from the 5th century BC to the 4th century AD. Their range stretched, at its largest in the 1st century AD, from the Caspian Sea across Eurasia and towards modern-day Poland.

The territory was known as Sarmatia and included today’s Central Ukraine, South-Eastern Ukraine, Southern Russia, Russian Volga and South-Ural regions, also to a smaller extent north-eastern Balkans and around Moldova. They had conflicts with the Roman Empire as they expanded east at their peak, allying themselves with Germanic tribes.

Towards the end of their reign, they faced competition from Germanic Goths and the Huns. The Sarmatians were eventually decisively assimilated by the burgeoning populations in Eastern Europe.

The burial is believed to belong to a leader of a Sarmatian nomadic tribe that dominated this part of Russia until the 5th century AD, and other VIPs of the ancient world, including a ‘laughing’ young man with an artificially deformed egg-shaped skull and excellent teeth that have survived two millennia.

‘We have been digging now for 12 days,’ said Mr Stukalov.’We have found multiple gold jewellery decorated with turquoise and inserts of lapis lazuli and glass.’The most ‘significant’ find is seen as a male skeleton buried inside a wooden coffin. 

This chieftain’s head was raised as if it rested on a pillow and he wore a cape decorated with gold plaques. Archaeologists found his collection of knives, items of gold, a small mirror and different pots, evidently signalling his elite status. They collected a gold and turquoise belt buckle and the chief’s dagger along with a tiny gold horse’s head which was buried between his legs, and other intricate jewellery.

Treasures uncovered by a farmer in southern Russia

Another grave was of an elderly man – his skeleton broke by an excavator – but buried with him was the head of his horse, its skull still dressed in an intricate harness richly decorated with silver and bronze when a farmer digging a pit on his land unearthed 2,000-year-old treasure inside the ancient burial mound of the tomb of a nomadic ‘royal’, along with a ‘laughing’ man (pictured) with an artificially deformed egg-shaped skull. Shaping and elongating the skull in this way was popular on various continents among ancient groupings like the Sarmatians, Alans, Huns and others.

An artificially deformed skull found by researchers in southern Russia.

The burial is believed to belong to a leader of a Sarmatian nomadic tribe that dominated this part of Russia until the 5th-century pieces of jewellery were found in the burial pit alongside the dead humans and animals and experts believe they were gifts for the dead.

The chief’s dagger was buried with him and places alongside his body, between his hand and leg (pictured)They collected a gold and turquoise belt buckle and the chief’s dagger along with a tiny gold horse’s head which was buried between his legs and other intricate jewellery.

Nearby was a woman with a bronze mirror who had been buried with a sacrificial offering of a whole lamb, along with various stone items, the meaning of which is unclear. Another grave was of an elderly man – his skeleton broke by an excavator – but buried with him was the head of his horse, its skull still dressed in an intricate harness richly decorated with silver and bronze.

Also in the burial mound was the skeleton of a young man with an artificially deformed egg-shaped skull. Local farmer Rustam Mudayev’s spade made an unusual noise and it emerged he had struck an ancient bronze pot near his village of Nikolskoye in the Astrakhan region.

A horse’s head buried on top of the old man’s body still carries an intricate silver and bronze harness which was also uncovered after the farmer took his find to the Astrakhan History museum for analysis and an experts opinion on the find. ‘As soon as the snow melted we organised an expedition to the village,’ said museum’s scientific researcher Georgy Stukalov.

‘After inspecting the burial site we understood that it to be a royal mound, one of the sites where ancient nomads buried their nobility,’ the archaeologist said we have been digging now for 12 days,’ said Mr Stukalov. ‘We have found multiple gold jewellery decorated with turquoise and inserts of lapis lazuli and glass’

A chieftain was buried with his head raised as if on a pillow and wearing a cape adorned with gold plagues the most ‘significant’ finds is seen as a male skeleton buried inside a wooden coffin. This chieftain’s head was raised as if it rested on a pillow and he wore a cape decorated with gold plagues.

The shape is likely to have been ‘moulded’ either by multiple bandaging or ‘ringing’ of the head in infancy. Such bandages and or rings were worn for the first years of a child’s life to contort the skull into the desired shape. Shaping and elongating the skull in this way was popular on various continents among ancient groupings like the Sarmatians, Alans, Huns and others.

Such deformed heads were seen as a sign of a person’s special status and noble roots, and their privileged place in their societies, it is believed. The burials date to around 2,000 years ago, a period when the Sarmatian nomadic tribes held sway in what is now southern Russia.

‘These finds will help us understand what was happening here at the dawn of civilisation,’ said Astrakhan region governor Sergey Morozov. Excavation is continuing at the site. Nearby was a woman with a bronze mirror who had been buried with a sacrificial offering of a whole lamb, along with various stone items, the meaning of which is unclear.

The gold jewellery and the buckle (pictured) are thought to be signs of the person’s nobility and would only have been afforded to the most wealthy people.