Egypt Archaeologists Discover 18,000 Notes Describing Lives of Ancient Civilisation
Archaeologists from the Institute for Ancient Near Eastern Studies at the University of Tübingen and the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities have unearthed a collection of more than 18,000 ostraca (inscribed pottery fragments) in the ancient Egyptian town of Athribis, near to the modern city of Sohag, Egypt. The artefacts document names, purchases of food and everyday objects, and even writings from a school.
Ostraca (plural for ostracon) are pottery fragments used as surfaces for writing or drawing.
They were used as notepads for private letters, laundry lists, records of purchases, and copies of literary works.
An ostracon with a child’s drawing.
By extension, the term is applied to flakes of limestone which were employed for similar purposes.
“In ancient times, ostraca were used in large quantities as writing material, inscribed with ink and a reed or hollow stick (calamus),” explained Professor Christian Leitz, a researcher with the Institute for Ancient Near Eastern Studies at the University of Tübingen, and his colleagues from the Athribis Project, an archaeological and philological endeavour investigating the ancient Egyptian town of Athribis.
The archaeologists uncovered a collection of more than 18,000 ostraca in the ruins of Athribis.
Fragment of a school text with a bird alphabet in Hieratic. On the right, the name of the bird, and on the left, the numbers from 5 to 8, which reflect the position of the letters in the list.
“These ostraca provide a variety of insights into the everyday life of Athribis,” they said.
“Around 80% of the potsherds are inscribed in Demotic, the common administrative script in the Ptolemaic and Roman periods, which developed from Hieratic after 600 BCE.”
“Among the second most common finds are ostraca with Greek script, but we also came across inscriptions in Hieratic, hieroglyphic and — more rarely — Coptic and Arabic scripts.”
Pupils had to write lines.
The researchers also found pictorial ostraca with various figurative representations, including animals such as scorpions and swallows, humans, deities from the nearby temple, even geometric figures.
“The contents of the ostraca vary from lists of various names to accounts of different foods and items of daily use,” they said.
“A surprisingly large number of sherds could be assigned to an ancient school.”
“There are lists of months, numbers, arithmetic problems, grammar exercises and a ‘bird alphabet’ — each letter was assigned a bird whose name began with that letter.”
Receipt for bread in Demotic; the loaves are distributed in multiples of 5 (often 5, sometimes 10 or 20); many of the buyers are women.
“Several hundreds of ostraca also contain writing exercises that we classified as punishment,” they added.
“They are inscribed with the same one or two characters each time, both on the front and back.”
Autopsy Unmasks King Tut’s True Face, and It Isn’t Pretty
King Tutankhamun was a hobbled, weak teenager with a cleft palate and club foot. And he probably has his parents to blame. The mother and father of the legendary boy pharaoh were actually brother and sister. The startling discovery was revealed today by a team led by Egyptian antiquities expert Dr Zahi Hawass. They identified the mummies of both his parents and both of his grandparents by studying DNA samples over two years.
For a long time, there were strong suspicions that he was murdered because he had a hole in the back of his head. But this is now believed to be due to the mummification process and scientists think the new research points to him dying from complications from a broken leg exacerbated by malaria.
The revelations are in stark contrast to the popular image of a graceful boy-king as portrayed by the dazzling funerary artefacts in his tomb that later introduced much of the world to the glory of ancient Egypt.
Meet the family: Scientists have for the first time – with the help of DNA – been able to identify these skulls as belonging to King Tut’s father Akhenaten (left) and mother (right). They were also brother and sister
King Tut has fascinated the world ever since his ancient tomb was unearthed by the British archaeologist Dr Howard Carter in the Valley of the Kings in 1922. The treasure in his tomb included a 24.2lb solid gold death mask encrusted with lapis lazuli and semi-precious stones. Rumours of a curse arose after Dr Carter’s benefactor Lord Carnarvon died suddenly a few months after the tomb was opened, even though Dr Carter went on to live another 16 years.
King Tut was known to be the son of the ‘heretic’ pharaoh Akhenaten, who tried to reform the Egyptian religion during his rule. But the identity of his mother had been shrouded in mystery – until now. The fact that his mother and father were brother and sister may seem bizarre today but incest was rife among the boy king’s family because pharaohs were believed to be descended from the gods.
Therefore it was an acceptable way of retaining the sacred bloodline. King Tut’s own wife Ankhesenpaaten, was his half-sister as they shared the same father. They were married when he was just ten. But Dr Hawass’ team found generations of inbreeding took their toll on King Tut – the last of his great dynasty.
The bone disease he suffered runs in families and is more likely to be passed down if two first-degree relatives marry and have children, the study published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association shows.
They described him as: ‘A young but frail king who needed canes to walk.’
This explains the presence of more than 100 canes in his tomb, which he would have needed in the afterlife. A sudden leg fracture possibly introduced by a fall might have resulted in a life-threatening condition when a malaria infection occurred,’ the JAMA article said.
Tut, who became pharaoh at the age of ten in 1333 BC, ruled for just nine years until his death. He was the last of the royal line from the eighteenth dynasty of the New Kingdom. The cause of King Tut’s death has long been disputed among historians, with many speculating that he was murdered.
Theories that he was assassinated stemmed from the fact that he was the last ruler of his dynasty and had a hole in the back of his head. However, in 2005 Dr Hawass announced his team had found no evidence for a blow to the back of the head, and the hole was from the mummification process. King Tut was succeeded by the high priest Ay for four years – who also married his widow Ankhesenpamon.
King Tut’s grandmother Queen Tiye, the mother of Pharaoh Akhenaten. The hairpiece behind her is believed to have been made up of her own hair. It has not disintegrated because of the mummification process and the dry conditions within the tomb
The two faces of the boy king Tutankhamun. Left, his mummified head and, right, reconstruction of what he would have looked like
Ay was followed by the military leader Horemheb who ruled for 26 years until he ceded power to Ramses, founder of the 19th dynasty. The researchers studied 16 mummies from the Valley of the Kings. They revealed that beneath the golden splendour in which they lived, ancient Egypt’s royals were as vulnerable as the lowliest peasant to disease.
Three other mummies besides tuts showed repeated malaria infections and incestuous marriages only worsened their maladies. However, analysis of King Tut’s family disproved speculation his family suffered from rare disorders that gave them feminine attributes and misshapen bones, including Marfan syndrome, a connective tissue disorder that can result in elongated limbs.
The theories arose from the artistic style and statues of the period, which showed the royal men with prominent breasts, elongated heads and flared hips.
‘It is unlikely that either Tutankhamun or Akhenaten actually displayed a significantly bizarre or feminine physique,’ the team said. One of the most impressive-looking mummies who was studied was King Tut’s grandmother, Queen Tiye.
She was the chief wife of Amenhotep III and mother of King Tut’s father Akhenaten. She was the first queen to figure so prominently beside her husband in statues and temple reliefs. Queen Tiye held much political influence at court and acted as an adviser to her son after the death of her husband. There has been speculation that her eldest son Prince Tuthmose was in fact Moses who led the Israelites into the Promised Land.
After 3,000 years and DNA analysis, scientists have proved that from foreground to background, these mummies are of King Tut’s mother, grandmother, and his father, Akhenaten
Antiquities expert Dr Zahi Hawass (right) announces today in Cairo’s Egypt Museum that the mummies in front of him have been identified as Tutankhamun’s father, mother and grandmother by using DNA
Technicians take DNA samples from the mummy of Boy Pharaoh Tutankhamun in the Valley of the Kings. Tests revealed his parents were siblings
A lock of her hair was found in a miniature coffin in King Tut’s tomb. Her tomb was identified by matching the labelled hair in Tut’s tomb with the well-preserved hair on her mummy. The ancient Egyptians were very concerned with maintaining their hair to promote their social status. They devised remedies for baldness and greying and regularly washed and scented their hair. Adults sometimes wore hairpieces and had elaborate styles.
The hairpiece found by Queen Tiye is believed to have been made up of her own hair. It has not disintegrated because of the mummification process and the dry conditions within the tomb. Hair does not continue to grow after death, instead, the skin retracts around the follicles as it dries, making the hair jut out more prominently.
King Tutankhamun has long been big business.
A 1970s Tut exhibit drew millions of visitors to U.S. museums, and a popular revival including artefacts from his tomb and others’ has been travelling around the United States for the past several years and is currently at San Francisco’s DeYoung Museum. Egypt’s economy depends a great deal on tourism, which brings in around $10billion a year in revenue. The King Tut exhibit at Cairo’s Egyptian Museum is one of the crown jewels of the country’s ancient past and features a stunning array of treasures including Tut’s most iconic relic – the golden funeral mask.
Another tourist destination is Tut’s tomb tucked in the Valley of the Kings amid Luxor’s desert hills. In 1922, British archaeologist Howard Carter discovered it and the trove of fabulous gold and precious stones inside, propelling the once-forgotten pharaoh into global stardom. Hundreds of tourists come daily to the tomb to see Tut’s mummy, which has been on display there since 2007.
Though historically Tut was a minor king, the grander image ‘is embedded in our psyche’ and the new revelations won’t change that, said James Phillips, a curator at Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History.
‘Reality is reality, but it’s not going to change his place in the folk heroism of popular culture,’ Phillips said. ‘The way he was found, what was found in his grave – even though he was a minor king, it has excited the imagination of people since 1922.’
Dr Zahi Hawass removed King Tut from his stone sarcophagus in 2007 to study his DNA. Tests revealed the king was a sickly young adult.
A group of UK-based researchers discovered the remains of a stillborn human fetus with an unusual condition in a 2,100-year-old Egyptian mummy long thought to be that of a hawk.
The mummy of an ancient bird was found at the Maidstone Museum in the United Kingdom. Its funerary casement featured a gilt-painted hawk’s face and was just the right size for a bird.
Horus, the Egyptian falcon-headed god, was also mentioned in the hieroglyphics on it.
All these decorations combined with the common practice of animal mummification in ancient Egypt led to the misidentification of the mummy.
Archaeologists long suspected that a tiny 2,100-year-old Egyptian mummy contained the remains of a hawk.A new analysis of the tiny mummy shows it was not a bird beneath the wrappings, but a stillborn human fetus
As a result, it was stored with other animal mummies without conducting CT scans or special attention.
However, the error came to light when the museum decided to scan their resident female mummy as well as a bunch of other animal mummies kept in storage including “EA 493 — Mummified Hawk Ptolemaic Period.”
The images of the scan revealed arms crossed over the chest and suggested that there was something else inside — a human or maybe a monkey — but not a bird for sure.
They called bioarchaeologist Andrew Nelson from Western University, London, to take a closer look.
Nelson and his interdisciplinary team conducted high-resolution micro-CT scans to virtually unwrap the mummy and found that it contains a severely malformed male human fetus, stillborn between 23 and 28 weeks of gestation.
The fetus, as the researchers revealed, suffered from major spinal abnormalities and a rare birth condition called anencephaly, wherein the brain and the skull fail to develop properly.
While the images revealed the mummified fetus had well-formed toes and fingers, the skull bore severe signs of deformities. “The whole top part of his skull isn’t formed,” Nelson said in a statement, noting that the brain of the fetus would not have formed in that scenario.
“The arches of the vertebrae of his spine haven’t closed. His earbones are at the back of his head.”
The work, as the researchers said, makes it the second mummified fetus to have been identified with anencephaly as well as the most studied fetal mummy in history.
“The family’s response was to mummify this individual, which was very rare. In ancient Egypt, fetuses tended to be buried in pots, below house floors, in various ways,” Nelson added.
According to Western University bioarchaeologist Andrew Nelson, there are only about six to eight known fetal mummies from ancient Egypt, making this family’s response very rare. The rarity of this mummification suggests it may have ties to ancient Egyptian magic
“There are only about six or eight known to have been mummified. So this was a very special individual.”
The findings also provide important clues into the diet of the baby’s mother and hint at a lack of foods containing folic acid, which plays a critical role in the development of the neural tube and can lead to anencephaly, if not provided sufficiently.
“It would have been a tragic moment for the family to lose their infant and to give birth to a very strange-looking fetus, not a normal-looking fetus at all,” the researcher concluded.
Fossils that “clearly foreshadow” modern humans are 30,000 years older than we thought
The Omo I and Herto fossils, found in East Africa, are the oldest known Homo sapiens fossils yet discovered in the region — but a new study shows they are tens of thousands of years older than we thought. Older studies had dated the Omo I and Herto fossils to 197,000 years old and between 155,000 to 160,000 years old, respectively. They are, in fact, far older.
“The Omo I and Herto specimens are the oldest Homo Sapiens that have been found so far [in the region], so their discovery and their age are critical to understanding the emergence of our species,” Céline Vidal, lead author on the study and a volcanologist at Fitzwilliam College, tells Inverse.
Vidal and her team use ancient volcanic eruptions to date the human fossils. In a study published Wednesday in the journal Nature, they re-examine the Omo I and Herto fossils in Ethiopia. The findings push back the starting point for human history in eastern Africa by some 36,000 years.
Researchers analyzed pumice rock from an ancient volcanic eruption in the area to determine an updated age for the Omo I fossils.
HOW THEY DID IT — In the past, scientists had used the age of the volcanic ash layer beneath the old bones to infer when the fossils were deposited.
But, “there was some uncertainty on the position of this layer relative to the fossil,” Vidal says.
Unfortunately, the sediment layer above the fossils contains a kind of thick volcanic ash known as KHS; the grains of this kind of ash is too small to accurately date using the current technology — so this layer was no help in trying to narrow down the fossils’ true age. Instead, archaeologists have tried to determine the Omo I and Herto fossils’ ages using the signatures of other past volcanic eruptions in the area.
“While studying big eruptions from the Ethiopian Rift, we identified a colossal eruption of Shala volcano, which occurred some 233,000 years ago,” Vidal says. “The age was obtained from pumice rocks found near the volcano.”
In this study, Vidal’s team used a dating method known as “single crystal argon-argon” dating — in this method, the scientists measure the amount of the element argon in volcanic minerals like ash and pumice rock. This signature allows scientists to pinpoint when the magma originally erupted from the Earth’s surface.
Brian Stewart, an assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Michigan who was not involved in the study, tells Inverse that, generally, “single-crystal argon-argon dating is very well established and reliable,” and is “beautifully suited” to studying fossils in eastern Africa due to the history of volcanic eruptions in the area.
“It is a remarkable method because it can go as far back in time as the age of the Earth,” Vidal says. Or, in the case of Vidal’s work: As far back as the time of the oldest modern human beings.
WHAT THEY FOUND — The researchers obtained a more precise minimum age of the Omo I fossils, specifically that they are likely 233,000 years old. It’s worth keeping in mind that the margin of error is pretty significant: Plus or minus 22,000 years — so they may be even older or younger.
“The error margin associated with this new date is obviously very large, and at its upper — younger — margin does not massively change the previous age estimate of the Omo I finds, perhaps moving it back in time by 10-15,000 years,” Stewart says.
If their true age is closer to the median estimated date of 233,000 years — or even older — then the finding is “definitely significant” Stewart adds.
Either way, the Omo I fossil specimens — the oldest known Homo sapiens in eastern Africa — have officially become much, much older. Since some archaeologists believe early modern humans may have originated in this region, that makes the findings all the more significant.
“Our findings push the age of the oldest Homo sapiens to later than 200,000 years,” Vidal says.
Did humans originate in eastern Africa? The updated findings on the date of the Omo I fossils could shift how we think about the evolution of humans on the continent.
WHY IT MATTERS — For too long, the official archaeological date — the age of the oldest known fossils of Homo sapiens from eastern Africa — hasn’t matched up with evolutionary models of human history. Evolutionary models suggest our species arose some 300,000 years ago. The oldest ever Homo sapiens fossils were discovered in Morocco — it is some 300,000 years old.
“The Omo I fossils exhibit traits that much more clearly foreshadow later Homo sapiens than those displayed by what has been proposed as the very earliest specimens in the sapiens lineage: the 300,000-year-old fossil skulls from Jebel Irhoud in Morocco,” Stewart says. The discovery puts the archaeological date of the Omo I fossils in closer proximity to this evolutionary timeline for Homo sapiens.
“This new age constraint is congruent with most models for the evolution of modern humans, which estimate the origin of H. sapiens and its divergence from archaic humans at about 350–200 thousand years ago,” Vidal says.
The findings could help settle another longstanding archaeological debate: Did our species originate in a single area in eastern Africa, or from multiple areas of the continent?
“Current opinions of our species’ origins have shifted away from a single-region African model and towards a multiregional African model,” Stewart says. The updated timeline of the Omo I fossils could shift the thinking about where and how humans evolved in Africa once more, Stewart explains:
“If the more modern-looking Omo specimens turn out to fall squarely within that time envelope, we may need think twice before we toss out a single origin model altogether, especially one that sees our species evolving across a single interconnected region that was much larger than previously imagined.”
WHAT’S NEXT — For now, Vidal and her team are clear: This is far from a definitive conclusion on the origins of humanity. While the study provides an updated “minimum age” for these fossil specimens in eastern Africa, the “maximum age” — i.e., the oldest age of the Omo I humans — is still a mystery.
Also, further research is needed to provide a more accurate age for the Herto fossils — the other significant site of ancient Homo sapiens found in the region.
“We can only date humanity based on the fossils that we have, so it’s impossible to say that this is the definitive age of our species,” Vidal says.
Future fossil findings could very well push the timeline of modern Homo sapiens “even further back in time.”
“The study of human evolution is always in motion; boundaries and timelines change as our understanding improves,” Vidal says.
Abstract: Efforts to date the oldest modern human fossils in eastern Africa, from Omo-Kibish1–3 and Herto4,5 in Ethiopia, have drawn on a variety of chronometric evidence, including 40Ar/39Ar ages of stratigraphically associated tuffs. The ages that are generally reported for these fossils are around 197 thousand years (kyr) for the Kibish Omo I3,6,7, and around 160–155 kyr for the Herto hominins5,8. However, the stratigraphic relationships and tephra correlations that underpin these estimates have been challenged6,8. Here we report geochemical analyses that link the Kamoya’s Hominid Site (KHS) Tuff9, which conclusively overlies the member of the Kibish Formation that contains Omo I, with a major explosive eruption of Shala volcano in the Main Ethiopian Rift. By dating the proximal deposits of this eruption, we obtain a new minimum age for the Omo fossils of 233 ± 22 kyr. Contrary to previous arguments6,8, we also show that the KHS Tuff does not correlate with another widespread tephra layer, the Waidedo Vitric Tuff, and therefore cannot anchor a minimum age for the Herto fossils. Shifting the age of the oldest known Homo sapiens fossils in eastern Africa to before around 200 thousand years ago is consistent with independent evidence for greater antiquity of the modern human lineage.
An Archaeologist Found The Ancient Tomb of The God Osiris?! – Right Under The Sphinx
Every culture has its legends and its myths. Most of us are familiar with the legend of King Arthur, the greatest king in British legends, and his queen Guinevere. Likewise, the mythology surrounding Osiris is one of the most prominent tales to come out of Egypt.
The main chamber. You can see the statue of Osiris at the back, with the stairs and central shaft going down.
Osiris is the ancient Egyptian god of the dead and the ruler of the underworld. As is true of many religions, the myths surrounding this figure are complex and varied.
He was the god of immortality; he was supposed to judge the dead, only allowing the morally worth into his afterlife; he was seen as a god of regeneration and rebirth, and he held a number of other roles that varied according to the cult.
But regardless of how he was seen, he was widely regarded as one of the more powerful Gods. And now, archaeologists have discovered an ancient tomb that appears to be directly modelled according to the mythical Tomb of Osiris.
This find was made by a Spanish-Italian archaeological team, in cooperation with the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities.
This tomb was described by Egyptian lore in the necropolis of Sheikh Abd el-Qurna, a funerary complex that is part of the Deir el-Bahari (the Northern Monastery) that is located on the West Bank at Thebes.
The tomb was initially uncovered back in 1887 by Philippe Virey. And in the 20th century there were some cursory efforts to map the main structure; however, Tomb Kampp -327, which you can see marked in red below, was never outlined.
The newly identified Osiris complex includes a shaft that connects to multiple chambers that hold a number of interesting artefacts.
One such area has a wall relief that shows a series of demons holding knives, which were placed there in order to protect the bodies of the dead.
Another chamber (the central vaulted chapel) has an emerald skinned deity sitting and facing a staircase with a 29.5-foot (9-meter) shaft in it.
The shaft connects to another room with a second shaft that goes down for 19.6 feet (6 meters) into two rooms. It’s a little bit like a maze, as you can see below.
The exact date of this structure’s creation is not known; however, researchers believe the tomb complex dates back to the 25th dynasty (760 – 656 BC) or the 26th dynasty (672 – 525 BC), based on a comparison to similar tombs that contain Osirian elements.
Drawing of the tomb’s architecture made by Raffaella Carrera, of the Min Project.
Ancient Egypt archaeologists find 30 mummies in a fire-scorched sacrificial chamber
Hidden within a fire-scorched structure near the Nile River in Aswan, Egypt, archaeologists discovered the entrance to a 2,000-year-old family tomb. Inside, they found 30 mummies of various ages, including several arthritis-ridden elderly people, as well as children and a newborn.
The newly discovered rectangular structure contains the tomb.
The tomb was discovered beneath a set of stairs.
Though the archaeologists have yet to date the tomb, they suspect a single family buried their dead in it over generations spanning the Ptolemaic and Roman periods (the first century B.C. to the second or third century A.D.)
According to Patrizia Piacentini, a professor of Egyptology and Egyptian Archaeology at the University of Milan, who was co-director of the excavation.
One of the mummies discovered in a coffin inside the tomb.Researchers discovered this colourful cartonnage inside the coffin of a child.
This new tomb is one of more than 300 recently discovered surrounding the Mausoleum of the Aga Khan, a pink granite structure built in the 20th century that sits on top of a slight hill along the Nile River.
But while most of the other tombs were found underground or dug into rocky hills, this particular tomb was unique in that it was found inside a larger above-ground structure, which the researchers think was likely used as a place of sacrifice.
“It seems that, due to its position along a valley of access to the necropolis, this building was used as a sacred enclosure where sacrifices were offered to the god Khnum in the form of Aries, creator god and protector of the fertile floods of the Nile, particularly revered in Aswan,” Piacentini told Live Science. “Who better than he could have propitiated the eternal life of those who rested in this necropolis?”
The archaeologists discovered a copper necklace with the inscription “Nikostratos” next to a mummy.
The researchers found this broken offering table in front of the tomb.
A barbotine bowl was among the finds.
A knife with an iron blade and wooden handle was among the finds, and the researchers think it may have been used by ancient robbers to cut the bandages of the mummies.
The researchers used a portable x-ray machine at the site to analyze the mummified head of a child.
Further supporting its use as a place of sacrifice, Piacentini and the team discovered signs of fire on the structure walls possibly from offering ceremonies; but some of the fire marks may have also been made by grave robbers, she added. Either way, inside that burned structure, they discovered animal bones, plant remains and offering tables.
Also hidden inside was a mummy of a man next to a copper necklace engraved with his name “Nikostratos.”
At the bottom of a staircase leading to the tomb entrance — which had been dug out of the rock —, they found a broken offering vase that still contained small fruits. The tomb, which was made up of four deeply-excavated chambers, contained the remains of around 30 mummies.
Some of the mummies were very well preserved, such as the remains of a child tucked inside a terracotta sarcophagus, while others had their bandages and cartonnage, a material ancient Egyptians used to wrap mummies, cut by ancient robbers.
The researchers also discovered a knife with an iron blade and wooden handle that may have been used by the plunderers. The researchers also say that Nikostratos was likely once inside the tomb with the other 30 mummies, but was taken out by the robbers.
The excavation was a joint venture between the Aswan and Nubian Antiquities Zone in Egypt and by the University of Milan in Italy; the researchers are continuing to analyze and date the finds.
“The study of the newly discovered structure is just beginning,” Piacentini said.
Quintessential human traits such as large brains first appear in Homo erectus nearly 2 million years ago. This evolutionary transition towards human-like traits is often linked to a major dietary shift involving greater meat consumption.
A new study published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, however, calls into question the primacy of meat-eating in early human evolution.
While the archaeological evidence for meat-eating increases dramatically after the appearance of Homo erectus, the study authors argue that this increase can largely be explained by greater research attention on this time period, effectively skewing the evidence in favour of the “meat made us human” hypothesis.
Homo erectus in East Africa surrounded by contemporary fauna
“Generations of paleoanthropologists have gone to famously well-preserved sites in places like Olduvai Gorge looking for — and finding — breathtaking direct evidence of early humans eating meat, furthering this viewpoint that there was an explosion of meat-eating after 2 million years ago,” W. Andrew Barr, an assistant professor of anthropology at the George Washington University and lead author on the study, said.
“However, when you quantitatively synthesize the data from numerous sites across eastern Africa to test this hypothesis, as we did here, that ‘meat made us human’ evolutionary narrative starts to unravel.”
Barr and his colleagues compiled published data from nine major research areas in eastern Africa, including 59 site levels dating between 2.6 and 1.2 million years ago.
They used several metrics to track hominin carnivory: the number of zooarchaeological sites preserving animal bones that have cut marks made by stone tools, the total count of animal bones with cut marks across sites, and the number of separately reported stratigraphic levels.
The researchers found that, when accounting for variation in sampling effort over time, there is no sustained increase in the relative amount of evidence for carnivory after the appearance of H. Erectus.
They note that while the raw abundance of modified bones and the number of zooarchaeological sites and levels all demonstrably increased after the appearance of H. Erectus, the increases were mirrored by a corresponding rise in sampling intensity, suggesting that intensive sampling – rather than changes in human behaviour – could be the cause.
“I’ve excavated and studied cut marked fossils for over 20 years, and our findings were still a big surprise to me,” Briana Pobiner, a research scientist in the Human Origins Program at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and co-author on the study, said.
“This study changes our understanding of what the zooarchaeological record tells us about the earliest prehistoric meat-eating. It also shows how important it is that we continue to ask big questions about our evolution, while we also continue to uncover and analyze new evidence about our past.”
In the future, the researchers stressed the need for alternative explanations for why certain anatomical and behavioural traits associated with modern humans emerged.
Possible alternative theories include the provisioning of plant foods by grandmothers and the development of controlled fire for increasing nutrient availability through cooking.
The researchers caution that none of these possible explanations currently have a strong grounding in the archaeological record, so much work remains to be done.
“I would think this study and its findings would be of interest not just to the paleoanthropology community but to all the people currently basing their dieting decisions around some version of this meat-eating narrative,” Barr said. “Our study undermines the idea that eating large quantities of meat drove evolutionary changes in our early ancestors.”
In addition to Barr and Pobiner, the research team included John Rowan, an assistant professor of anthropology at the University of Albany; Andrew Du, an assistant professor of anthropology and geography at Colorado State University; and J. Tyler Faith, an associate professor of anthropology at the University of Utah.
Ancient city found in Ethiopia sheds new light on country’s history
Archaeologists have uncovered an ancient, forgotten city in Ethiopia once thought to be the home of giants. The discovery reveals important new information about the origins of international trade and Islam in the country between the 10th and early 15th centuries.
This is the first evidence that proves Eastern Ethiopia was well connected with the Gulf, Egypt and India hundreds of years ago and highlights how skilled craftsmen traded with communities around the world and lived alongside people from different areas around the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea.
A dig in Harlaa, Eastern Ethiopia, has revealed a 12th-century mosque, evidence of Islamic burials and headstones as well as glass vessel fragments, rock crystal, carnelian, glass beads, imported cowry shells, and pottery from Madagascar, the Maldives, Yemen and China. Archaeologists have found bronze and silver coins from 13th-century Egypt.
A dig in Harlaa, Eastern Ethiopia, has revealed a 12th-century mosque.
There has so far been very little archaeological research carried out in Islamic sites in Ethiopia, with experts more focused on finding early humans in the region.
Archaeologists had not previously carried out extensive work in this part of Ethiopia. Farmers had been uncovering pottery and coins for many years in the area and were convinced there was rich information about Ethiopia’s history to be found underground.
The size of some of the building stones also found created a local legend that the area had been home to giants.
Archaeologists worked with the community for two years to make the discoveries, which will be exhibited in a heritage centre run by local people designed to bring income to the area.
Some findings will be displayed in the country’s national museum in Addis Ababa. The work was completed in partnership with the Ethiopian Authority for Research and Conservation of Cultural Heritage.
Professor Timothy Insoll, from the Institute of Arabic and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter, who led the research, said: “This discovery revolutionises our understanding of trade in an archaeologically neglected part of Ethiopia. What we have found shows this area was the centre of trade in that region.
The city was a rich, cosmopolitan centre for jewellery making and pieces were then taken to be sold around the region and beyond. Residents of Harlaa were a mixed community of foreigners and local people who traded with others in the Red Sea, Indian Ocean and possibly as far away as the Arabian Gulf.”
Harlaa is 120km from the Red Sea coast and 300km from Addis Adaba. The architecture of the mosque is similar to those found in Southern Tanzania and Somaliland, showing connections between different Islamic communities in Africa.
Remains found in the dig suggest jewellers were making high-quality, delicate pieces in silver, bronze and semi-precious stones and glass beads. They used some technology usually associated in that period with jewellers in India, suggesting trade or immigration from that country to Harlaa.
The settlement, which is around 500m by 1,000m, has buildings and walls constructed with large stone blocks – leading people to assume only those with enormous stature or strength could have built it, and encouraging local legends about giants having inhabited the region.
The remains of some of the 300 people buried in the cemetery are being analysed to see what their diet consisted of.
Professor Insoll said: “The archaeological findings suggest this place was home to a very mixed community. Local people were extremely keen for us to solve mysteries. Farmers had been finding strange objects, including Chinese coins, as they were working on their land, and a legend began that the area was home to giants. We have obviously disproved that, but I’m not sure they fully believe us yet. Some people have said the bodies we have discovered are the children of giants!”
The research is funded by the European Research Council and previously by the Max Van Berchem Foundation in Switzerland.
The archaeologists, from the Universities of Exeter, Addis Ababa and Leuven, will dig again next year, in other sites and deeper underground, to uncover more evidence of people who lived there earlier in history. So far, they have excavated down to a depth of 2.5 metres and dated this to the 6th century.
Professor Insoll said: “We know jewellery was being made here for trading into the African interior, and materials to do this came in from the Red Sea, East African Coast and possibly India, but we don’t know what was given in exchange for that jewellery. During the next stage of our archaeological research in this era, we hope to examine this by working on other sites up to 100km away.”
