Category Archives: ASIA

ASIA, ISRAEL, WORLD

Skeletons Found near-dead Sea Scrolls likely belonged to an Enigmatic Religious Group

Skeletons Found near-dead Sea Scrolls likely belonged to an Enigmatic Religious Group

More than 30 newly discovered 2,200-year-old skeletons could finally help to reveal who wrote the ancient Dead Sea Scrolls. Remains found near the site where the scrolls were discovered suggest the bodies were linked to a celibate Jewish brotherhood known as the Essenes.

The Dead Sea Scrolls have fascinated scholars and historians since the ancient texts were found around 70 years ago scattered within a series of caves in the West Bank.

Thought to have been written between 200 BC and 100 AD, the scrolls inscribe some of the oldest known foundations of the Old Testament.

Despite experts citing the texts as among the biggest archaeological finds of the 20th Century, their origins and authorship have remained a mystery for decades.

More than 30 newly discovered 2,200-year-old skeletons could finally help to reveal who wrote the ancient Dead Sea Scrolls. Remains found near the site where the scrolls (file photo) were discovered suggest they were linked to an ancient Jewish group known as the Essenes

Ever since their discovery, a number of suggestions have been put forward as to who created or oversaw the texts, including soldiers, craftsmen, people from the Iron Age, or Bedouins.

Now an analysis of remains found in 33 newly uncovered graves could help experts to understand the mysterious texts’ history.

Analyses of the bones support a previous theory that the scrolls were written or guarded by members of a celibate, all-male Jewish sect called the Essenes. The mysterious group flourished in Palestine from the 2nd century BC to the end of the 1st century AD.

Like the scrolls themselves, the graves were found in Qumran, an archaeological region in the West Bank along the northwestern shore of the Dead Sea. Anthropologists from the Israel Antiquities Authority in Jerusalem radiocarbon-dated the bones, revealing they are about 2,200 years old, around the same age as the scrolls.

But it was not just the age of the bones that linked them to the ancient texts.

All but three of the 33 skeletons were identified as probably male, based on factors such as body size and pelvic shape.

The Dead Sea Scrolls have fascinated scholars and historians since the ancient texts were found around 70 years ago scattered within a series of caves in the West Bank

The remaining remains may have belonged to men too, but not enough skeletal evidence exists to be sure.

Of the 30 skeletons identified as male, each was aged between 20 and 50 – or possibly older – when they died.

These parallels suggest the skeletons were once members of the mysterious Essenes crypt, the researchers claimed.

‘I don’t know if these were the people who produced the Qumran region’s Dead Sea Scrolls,’ project scientist Dr Yossi Nagar told ScienceNews.

‘But the high concentration of adult males of various ages buried at Qumran is similar to what has been found at cemeteries connected to Byzantine monasteries.’

Given the lack of signs of injury on their bones, the men were unlikely to have been soldiers, the researchers said. Dr Nagar presented the findings last Thursday during the annual meeting of the American Schools of Oriental Research.

As there appear to be no women in the burial, the group was likely a ‘community of ideologically celibate men… child proportion and adult age at death distribution match the common desert monasteric societies of the subsequent periods’, the researchers, led by Dr Nagar, wrote in their paper.

Previous finds at sites around Qumran have suggested it was founded more than 2,700 years ago. The people of Qumran abandoned the area after the war tore the region apart, returning to reoccupy it for 200 years, up to around 68 AD. An early theory on the creation of the Dead sea Scrolls claimed that members of an ancient, celibate Jewish sect, the Essenes, lived in Qumran.

Thought to have been written between 200 BC and 100 AD, the scrolls inscribe some of the oldest known foundations of the Old Testament

The theory says the group either wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls or were caretakers of the legal, philosophical and religious documents. Over the past 30 years, many other theories have been put forward, including that the scrolls were written by Bedouin herders, craftsmen and Roman soldiers. 

ASIA, ISRAEL, WORLD

Israel Returns Smuggled Artifacts to Egypt

Israel Returns Smuggled Artifacts to Egypt

Foreign Minister Yair Lapid on Thursday presented his Egyptian counterpart Sameh Shoukry with dozens of Egyptian relics that were illegally smuggled into Israel. Lapid met Shoukry in Cairo after first holding talks with President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi.

Eli Eskozido, Director of the Israel Antiquities Authority, joined Lapid to hand over the 95 artefacts, which included two stone tablets with hieroglyphic writing, a piece of a sarcophagus with hieroglyphics, papyrus documents and dozens of small idols of Egyptian gods.

The items were laid out on a table covered in a green tablecloth as Eskozido and Lapid officially transferred them over to Egypt.

Four of the relics were nabbed by Israeli customs agents in 2013 as an Israeli antiquities dealer tried to bring them into the country through Ben Gurion Airport after purchasing them in Oxford, England. Israel alerted Egyptian authorities through Interpol, and after a legal battle, the relics were handed over to Israel in 2015.

The other Egyptian artefacts were found in a Jerusalem antiquities dealership in August 2013. IAA and Foreign Ministry officials met with Egypt’s ambassador in September of that year and agreed to conduct a joint investigation.

The next month, 91 relics were seized from the shop. During the ensuing legal process, Egypt sent documentation of the artefacts and expert opinion from Yousef Hamed Khalifa, the director of Cairo and Giza for the Egyptian Tourism and Antiquities Ministry.

As a compromise, the dealer handed the items over to Israeli authorities.

IAA head Eli Eskozido (L) and IAA Robbery Prevention Unit head Amir Ganor examine looted Egyptian artifacts returned to Egypt by Eskozido and Foreign Minister Yair Lapid (Yoli Schwartz/IAA)

“The Antiquities Authority praises Foreign Minister Lapid’s initiative and is happy it was able to help the Egyptian authorities return to the Egyptian people Egyptian cultural artefacts that were stolen from Egypt,” Eskozido said in a statement.

“Israel and the Antiquities Authority are interested in working in concert with the Egyptian authorities to protect archaeological treasures that belong to humanity’s culture. It is vital to act to stymie the stealing of antiquities and the illegal trade in antiquities across the world.

The IAA is eager to tighten cooperation with the Egyptian Supreme Council of Antiquities on archaeology and research.”

Earlier in the day, Lapid met with Sissi in Cairo, where the two discussed the Iranian threat and Israel’s attempts to reach a long-term ceasefire agreement with the Hamas terror group in Gaza.

Some of the 95 looted artifacts returned to Egypt by Foreign Minister Yair Lapid and IAA head Eli Eskozido, December 9, 2021 (Yoli Schwartz/IAA)

Lapid and Sissi spoke about Tehran’s nuclear program and the threat to regional stability posed by its support for armed proxy groups, according to the Foreign Ministry.

Lapid also presented his vision for Gaza, which would offer economic incentives in return for an end to Hamas attacks, and discussed the issue of Israeli civilians and the remains of two Israeli soldiers being held in the Strip.

“Egypt is an especially important strategic partner for Israel,” Lapid said in a statement after the meeting. “My goal is to strengthen our security, diplomatic, and economic ties with Egypt.

It is important to continue to work on the peace between the two nations.

I thank President Sissi, whose contribution to the region and to the ties between us are of historic proportions, for the hospitality, and for the warm and open meeting.”

Some of the 95 stolen artefacts returned to Egypt by Foreign Minister Yair Lapid and IAA head Eli Eskozido, December 9, 2021 (Yoli Schwartz/IAA)

Lapid previously met with Shoukry in July, when the two men were in Brussels for an EU conference.

Lapid’s visit to Egypt follows Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s meeting at Sharm el-Sheikh with Sissi in September, the first such summit between Israeli and Egyptian leaders in more than a decade.

The rest of the relics were held in an antique store in Jerusalem. Egypt said they had been stolen.
ASIA, ISRAEL, WORLD

Researchers in Israel have discovered an intact chicken egg laid about 1,000 years ago—though the delicate object cracked in the lab

Researchers in Israel have discovered an intact chicken egg laid about 1,000 years ago—though the delicate object cracked in the lab

Researchers in Israel have discovered an intact chicken egg laid about 1,000 years ago—though the delicate object cracked in the lab.

“We were astonished to find it,” Alla Nagorsky, an archaeologist with the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), tells Haaretz’s, Ruth Schuster. “From time to time we find fragments of eggshells, but a whole egg is extraordinary.”

The team discovered the egg in a cesspit in the industrial zone of the ancient city of Yavneh. As Amy Spiro reports for the Times of Israel, the egg remained unbroken for so long because it was pillowed in soft human waste, which created anaerobic, or oxygen-free, conditions and prevented its decay.

“Even today, eggs rarely survive for long in supermarket cartons,” says Nagorsky in a statement. “It’s amazing to think this is a 1,000-year-old find!”

Per the statement, the shell cracked despite staff taking “extreme caution” when removing it from the cesspit under the supervision of an experienced conservationist. Luckily, Ilan Naor, director of the IAA’s Organic Materials Conservation Laboratory, was able to repair the crack. While much of the egg’s contents leaked out, some of the yolks remained, and the researchers preserved it for future DNA analysis.

Alla Nagorsky and her colleagues examined the ancient egg.

The discovery was part of an excavation conducted ahead of the development of a new neighbourhood in the Israeli city. The cesspit also contained three dolls made out of bone—toys typical of the period—and an oil lamp.

Nagorsky tells Haaretz that the team was able to date the finds using the lamp, which was of a type only made in the late Abbasid period.

The Abbasid caliphate ruled much of the Middle East from 750 until the Mongol invasion of 1258. It lost control of Jerusalem when Europeans captured the city during the First Crusade in 1099.

Lee Perry Gal, an IAA archaeologist and expert on poultry in the ancient world, tells the Jerusalem Post’s Rossella Tercatin that broken eggshells are relatively common finds during excavations of ancient sites—but discovering a complete egg is extremely unusual.

“Chickens were domesticated in southeast Asia relatively recently, around 6,000 years ago, but it took time for them to enter the human diet,” she says. “They were used for other purposes, such as cockfighting, and they were considered beautiful animals, exhibited in ancient zoos and given as presents to kings.”

Perry Gal adds that one of the earliest known sites with evidence of chicken farming is also located in Israel. People living in Maresha appear to have raised the fowl 2,300 years ago, after Alexander the Great conquered Jerusalem.

In other ancient chicken news, Allison Robicelli of the Takeout reports that researchers examining 3,000-year-old bird bones found in Britain learned that domestic fowl of that time lived, on average, for 2 to 4 years. That’s much longer than the 33- to the 81-day lifespan of chickens in modern industrial farming systems. Writing in the International Journal of Osteoarchaeology, the researchers posit that the chickens were used in ritual sacrifices or cockfighting.

“Domestic fowl were introduced in the Iron Age and likely held a special status, where they were viewed as sacred rather than as food,” says lead author Sean Doherty, an archaeologist at the University of Exeter, in a statement. “Most chicken bones show no evidence for butchery, and were buried as complete skeletons rather than with other food waste.”

The findings build on previous evidence suggesting that early cultivation of animals often took place for reasons other than consumption, reported Rory Sullivan for CNN last year.

As Julius Caesar wrote in Commentarii de Bello Gallico, “The Britons consider it contrary to divine law to eat the hare, the chicken or the goose. They raise these, however, for their own amusement or pleasure.”

ASIA, EUROPE, RUSSIA, WORLD

Pyramids Discovered In Russia Twice As Old As Egyptian Could Rewrite Human History

Pyramids Discovered In Russia Twice As Old As Egyptian Could Rewrite Human History

The discovery of the world’s earliest pyramids on the Kola Peninsula may confirm the existence of an ancient civilisation on Russian territory. The civilization likely predates the Egyptian civilization for a long time.

Archaeological excavations of the Kola Peninsula’s pyramids, which are believed to be at least two times older than Egyptian pyramids, have been resumed last year. It is still not known by whom or how they were built.

The mystery of the pyramids of Kola Peninsula

Pyramids Discovered In Russia Twice As Old As Egyptian Could Rewrite Human History

The Kola Peninsula is a peninsula located in the Murmansk area of Russia’s European portion. The Barents and White Seas flow across it. The area is around 100,000 square kilometres. The north has tundra vegetation, whereas the south has forest tundra and taiga. The peninsula’s climate is somewhat chilly all the year.

The extraordinary discovery of the world’s oldest pyramids on the Kola Peninsula indicates the existence of the legendary Hyperborea. The Kola Peninsula has recently become a fascinating place for scientific researchers and enthusiasts.

Many of the scientists who made a scientific expedition to this enigmatic place believe that the Kola peninsula may be the ancestral home to Earth’s most ancient civilization. Scientists’ discoveries of step pyramids and massive stone slabs that were precisely cut 9000-40000 years ago provide compelling evidence for this incredible idea.

Were the Hyperboreans responsible for the Kola Pyramids?

Archaeologists have studied intriguing pyramid structures on the Kola peninsula, which have the potential to rewrite our history. The pyramids have been built with precision and are thought to be at least 9,000 years old, which could be even older than Göbekli Tepe, the world’s oldest temple.

The earliest known investigation of the Kola pyramids took place in the early 1920s when Russian scholar Alexander Vasilyevich Barchenko (1881–1938) arrived with a scientific team to explore the enigmatic, undiscovered ancient monuments in Russia’s unexplored part. However, Barchenko was not a mainstream scientist, and to date, his beliefs are controversial, as well as intriguing at the same time.

Barchenko became persuaded that the Kola pyramids were built by the lost civilisation of Hyperborea, a mythological island according to the ancient Greeks. Hecataeus of Miletus (550 BC-476 BC), the earliest recorded Greek historian, believed the Hyperborean holy site located “on an island in the ocean…beyond the country of the Celts.”

According to Diodorus Siculus (90 BC-30 BC), a Greek historian, God Apollo visited the unknown country of Hyperborea on his swan drawn chariot on a regular basis.

“Opposite to the coast of Celtic Gaul there is an island in the sea, not smaller than Sicily, situated to the north—which is inhabited by the Hyperboreans, who are so named because they live beyond the North Wind,” Diodorus said. “This island has a pleasant climate, fertile soil, and is abundant in everything, producing twice a year.”

According to the Diodorus’ statement in Historic Library, Greek goddess Leto, the daughter of the Titans Coeus and Phoebe, the sister of Asteria, and the mother of Apollo and Artemis, was born in Hyperborea, and as a result, the locals worship Apollo more than any other God. They are, in a sense, his priests, because they constantly praise him and lavish him with awards.

“There is a lovely Apollo grove on this island, as well as a spectacular circular temple decorated with many dedicated offerings. There is also a city dedicated to the same God, the majority of whose residents are harpers who constantly play their harps at the temple and sing songs to the God praising his deeds. The Hyperboreans speak a unique dialect and have a strong connection to the Greeks, particularly the Athenians and the Delians…”

It is also said that the moon appears very close to the earth in this island, that certain eminences of a terrestrial form can be clearly seen in it, that Apollo visits the island once every nineteen years, during which period the stars complete their revolutions, and that for this reason, the Greeks distinguish the cycle of nineteen years by the name of “the great year.”

Hyperborea has never been discovered, but that, according to many theorists, doesn’t imply it didn’t exist. Hyperborea’s submerged ancient remains may yet be unearthed. Could the abandoned Kola Pyramids in Russia’s North be the remnants of a long-lost, sophisticated ancient civilization about which we know almost nothing?

According to Barchenko’s view, people came from the northern areas around 12,000 years ago. A massive flood drove Aryan tribes residing there to flee the area during the so-called Golden Age, which occurred around 10,000-12,000 years ago. The Aryan tribes left the Kola Peninsula and travelled to the south.

After studying Masonic literature, the late Russian scientist gradually came to believe that the Hyperboreans were a highly sophisticated society capable of atomic energy, levitation, and flight. He also believed that Sami shamans living on the Kola Peninsula were the keepers of Hyperborea’s old wisdom.

Bashenko was a keen student of religious and mystical matters, and while his hypotheses were never proven, they are nevertheless of considerable interest to scholars of alternative ancient history. On April 25, 1938, Bashenko was killed in Moscow as part of the Great Purge.

Inside the Kola Pyramids, there are unknown voids and chambers

Later in 2007, a Russian expedition team attempted to investigate the Kola Pyramids. Among these experts were Pulkovo Observatory press secretary Sergey Smirnov, candidate of physical and mathematical sciences, Valery Chudinov, Professor of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, and Dmitry Subetto, Professor, doctor of geological and geographical sciences.

The voyage was more arduous and risky than the researchers had anticipated. The Kola Pyramids are in a secluded area, and the inhabitants, the Lapps, we’re hesitant to show them the route.

According to one of the team members, Russian experts viewed the pyramids from a helicopter, but owing to extensive foliage, not all buildings were visible from the air.

Their chopper nearly crashed, but they made it to the old site and studied these strange buildings. The Kola pyramids, according to Russian geologists, are two 50-meter-high structures linked by a bridge and aligned to the cardinal points.

“We carried a unique device, the most sophisticated geophysical equipment – the Oko georadar – on the expedition,” one of the researchers explained.

Like an x-ray, the instrument “shines through” the interior space of any item. The geologists reached an unambiguous conclusion: the heights are anthropogenic in origin; hence, they are not natural hills, but man-made pyramids ― the product of human hands. Inside the pyramids, there are gaps and undiscovered rooms.

The Russian pyramids’ function, purpose and who constructed them are still unclear. They might have been utilised as an astronomical observatory in ancient times or might be used as sacred ground. For now, what is known about the Kola Pyramids is that they are far older than the Egyptian pyramids, and their presence adds another intriguing segment to human history. In the end, the enigma of the Russian Pyramids in the Kola Peninsula has remained unexplained to this day.

ASIA, EUROPE, RUSSIA, WORLD

Ancient silver plate adorned with winged gods and griffins is found inside the wooden tomb of a warrior

Ancient silver plate adorned with winged gods and griffins is found inside the wooden tomb of a warrior who died in the 4th century BC in Russia

Expedition members of IA RAS have found a unique plate depicting winged Scythian gods surrounded by griffons during their excavations of the burial ground Devitsa V in Ostrogozhsky District of Voronezh region.

This is the first case of such a finding in the Scythian barrows on Middle Don. No other items depictions of gods from the Scythian pantheon have been found in this area.

“The finding has made an important contribution to our concepts of Scythian beliefs. Firstly, a particular number of gods are depicted at once on one item. Secondly, it has never happened before that an item with depicted gods has been found so far from the north-east of the main Scythian centers,” said the head of the Don expedition, Prof. Valeriy Gulyaev.

Ancient silver plate adorned with winged gods and griffins is found inside the wooden tomb of a warrior who died in the 4th century BC in Russia
Silverplate with a depiction of Scythian Gods and eagle head griffons.

Burial ground Devitsa V—named after the neighbouring village area—was found in 2000 by the Don archaeological expedition of IA RAS.

The site is situated on the hill of the right bank of the river Devitsa and is a group of 19 mounds which are situated in two parallel chains stretched from west to east. However, the significant part of ancient barrows has already disappeared: the necropolis area belongs to an agricultural sector and is being actively plowed.

Since 2010 the site has been systematically studied by the specialists from the Don expedition of IA RAS. During the cemetery excavations, some great discoveries have already been made.

In 2019 in barrow 9 a burial was found which held the remains of a woman-warrior and an old lady in ceremonial female headwear known as a calathus.

In a field season in 2021, the Don archaeological expedition continued studying the necropolis. Archaeologists started the excavation of mound 7 in the central part of the cemetery Devitsa V in the vicinity of barrow 9.

The main grave referred to the Scythian times and dated back to the 4th century BC was located almost under the center of one mound and was a wooden tomb of 7.5×5 meters. In ancient times it was covered with oak half beams which were held by the seventeen large oak pillars on the gravesides. This is the biggest grave among all found in Devitsa V necropolis.

The barrow had already been plundered in ancient times. The robbers laid a wide test pit and “cleaned” a central part of the burial including the skeleton. However, by the time of the plundering the roof of the tomb had already fallen and that is why in the mixture of soil and tree remnants on the gravesides some grave goods have been preserved. Found items completely match the main elements of the Scythian “triad.” Equipment, harness, and “animal style” artifcats were found in a warrior’s grave.

There was a skeleton of a man of 40-49 years old in the grave. Next to his head archaeologists found many small gold semi-sphere plates which were decorated the funeral bed. Along with the skeleton an iron knife and a horse rib (likely, the remains of the ceremonial food), a spearhead, and three javelin’s heads were found.

The scientists have been able to reconstruct the length of the weapon relying on that the counterweights of the lower part of the polearm that have been remained untouched. The spear was about 3.2 meters long, and the javelines’ length was about 2.2 meters.

In the southeast corner of the grave were fragments of three horse harness items: horse-bits, girth buckles, iron browbands, as well as iron, bronze, and bone Scythian pendants.

The archaeologists have also found six bronze plates in the shape of wolves with grin laws which were decorated with horse cheeks—two on each harness. Next to the horse harness was a cut jaw of a young bear which testifies, according to the scientists, to the bear cult at the Scythes of Middle Don.

Apart from it a moulded cup and a big, black-glazed vessel have been found in different parts of the tomb.

In the northeast part of the grave separate from other items and a few meters far from the skeleton a silver square plate nailed by many small silver nails to a wooden base was found. The length of the plate was 34.7 cm, with the width in the middle part 7.5 cm.

READ ALSO: DNA SHOWS SCYTHIAN WARRIOR MUMMY WAS A 13-YEAR-OLD GIRL

In the central part of the plate is a winged figure facing a Goddess of animal and human fertility. The Goddess is known as Argimpasa, Cybele. The upper part of her body is stripped, and there is headwear, likely a crown with horns, on her head.

The Goddess is surrounded on both sides with the figures of winged eagle-headed griffons. Depictions of this type, where the traditions of Asia Minor and ancient Greek are mixed, are often found in excavations of the Scythian barrows of the Northern Sea region, the Dnieper forest-steppe region, and the Northern Caucasus.

The left side of the plate is formed by two square plates decorated with the depictions of syncretic creatures standing in a so-called heraldic pose (in front of each other, close to each other with their paws). From the right side, two round buckles are attached to the plate on each of which one anthropomorphic character with a crown on his head standing surrounded by two griffons is depicted. Who those characters are and which item was decorated by this plate remains an open issue.

ASIA, CHINA, WORLD

3,000-Year-Old Road, Drainage Pipe Unearthed in China

3,000-Year-Old Road, Drainage Pipe Unearthed in China

Relics of drainage pipe, road and rut remains have been found in the ruins of Haojing, an ancient capital city dating back to the Western Zhou Dynasty (1046 B.C.-771 B.C.), according to the Shaanxi Academy of Archaeology.

The drainage pipe was uncovered in the foundation of the No. 14 building on its central-south edge, which was excavated between 2019 and 2020, the institute said on Wednesday.

Over 3 meters long, the pipe ruins are made of four round earthenware pipes with a diameter of about 25 centimetres, providing physical materials for further studies on the drainage system of the No. 14 building.

Drainage pipe, ancient road unearthed in Xi'an city
Drainage pipe, ancient road unearthed in Xi’an city

Meanwhile, an ancient road with a rut of about 12 meters long was also discovered in the recent excavation. About 1.4 meters below the existing surface, the road extends about 30 meters from west to east with a width of about 6 meters.

The vehicle rut is about 12 meters long and 8 centimetres in depth. It is the first time for the archaeologists to find such road and track remains at the site, said the institute.

READ ALSO: ANCIENT WALLS OF BENIN WERE FOUR TIMES LONGER THAN THE WALLS OF CHINA

The No. 14 foundation site, which covers more than 1,800 square meters, is believed to have been used in the middle to late Western Zhou Dynasty period and is of great importance for further research on the architecture functions, construction techniques and the capital layout of the dynasty.

Haojing site, where the capital city of the Western Zhou Dynasty was located, was excavated in the current city of Xi’an, the capital of northwest China’s Shaanxi Province.

The ancient ruins have a total area of around 920 hectares

ASIA, INDONESIA, WORLD

Intact DNA from a 7,200-year-old Woman reveals Unknown Human lineage

Intact DNA from a 7,200-year-old Woman reveals Unknown Human lineage

Archaeologists have discovered ancient DNA in the remains of a woman who died 7,200 years ago in Indonesia, a find that challenges what was previously known about the migration of early humans.

Intact DNA from a 7,200-year-old Woman reveals Unknown Human lineage
The skeletal remains of the ancient Toalean woman were found nestled among large rocks in a burial pit in Indonesia’s Leang Panninge cave.

The remains, belonging to a teenager nicknamed Bessé, were discovered in the Leang Panninge cave on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi. Initial excavations were undertaken in 2015.

The discovery, published in the journal Nature, is believed to be the first time ancient human DNA has been discovered in Wallacea, the vast chain of islands and atolls in the ocean between mainland Asia and Australia.

The DNA was extracted from the petrous part of Bessé’s temporal bone, which houses the inner ear.

Griffith University’s Prof Adam Brumm, who co-led the research, said the intact DNA was a rare find.

“The humid tropics are very unforgiving on DNA preservation in ancient human bones and teeth,” Brumm said.

“There’s only one or two pre-neolithic skeletons that have yielded ancient DNA in all of mainland south-east Asia.

“Elsewhere in the world – in the northern latitudes of Europe, in America – ancient DNA analysis is completely revolutionising our understanding of the early human story: the genetic diversity of ancient humans, population movements, demographic history.”

Initial excavations started in 2015 at the Leang Panninge cave on the island of Sulawesi.

The researchers describe Bessé as a “genetic fossil”. Genetic sequencing showed she had a unique ancestral history not shared by anyone living today, nor any known humans from the ancient past, Brumm said.

Around half of Bessé’s genetic makeup is similar to present-day Indigenous Australians and people from New Guinea and the Western Pacific islands.

“Her ancestors would have been a part of the initial wave of movement of early humans from mainland Asia through these Wallacean islands towards what we today call Sahul, which was the combined ice age landmass of Australia and New Guinea,” Brumm said.

Toalean stone arrowheads. Bessé remains were found alongside prehistoric tools and red ochre.

Surprisingly, Bessé’s DNA also showed an ancient link to east Asia, which challenges what was previously known about the timeline of migration to Wallacea.

“It is thought that the first time people with predominantly Asian ancestry entered the Wallacean region was around about three or four thousand years ago when the first prehistoric neolithic farmers entered the region from Taiwan,” Brumm said.

READ ALSO: THEY REBUILD THE FACES OF EGYPTIAN MUMMIES FROM THEIR 2,000-YEAR-OLD DNA

“If we’re finding this Asian ancestry in a hunter-gatherer person who lived thousands of years before the arrival of these neolithic people from Taiwan, then it suggests … earlier movement of some population from Asia into this region.”

Bessé is also the first known skeleton belonging to the Toalean culture, a group of hunter-gatherers who lived in South Sulawesi between 1,500 and 8,000 years ago.

She was around 17 to 18 years old at the time of burial. Prehistoric stone tools and red ochre were found alongside her remains. Her grave also contained bones of hunted wild animals.

ASIA, INDONESIA, WORLD

Long-Hidden “Pyramid” Found in Indonesia Was Likely an Ancient Temple

Long-Hidden “Pyramid” Found in Indonesia Was Likely an Ancient Temple

When Dutch colonists became the first Europeans to discover Gunung (Mount) Padang in the early 20th century, they must have been awestruck by the sheer scale of their ancient stone surroundings.

Here, scattered across a vast hilltop in the West Java province of Indonesia, lay the remnants of a massive complex of rocky structures and monuments – an archaeological wonder since described as the largest megalithic site in all of Southeastern Asia.

But those early settlers couldn’t have guessed the greatest wonder of all might lay hidden, buried deep in the ground below their feet.

In controversial new research presented at the AGU 2018 Fall Meeting in Washington, DC, last week, a team of Indonesian scientists presented data to make their case that Gunung Padang is in fact the site of the world’s oldest known pyramid-like structure.

Their research, which has been conducted over the course of several years, suggests that Gunung Padang is not the hill we think it is – but is actually a layered series of ancient structures with foundations dating back some 10,000 years (or even older).

“Our studies prove that the structure does not cover just the top but also wrap around the slopes covering about 15 hectares area at least,” the authors write in the abstract for their new poster.

“The structures are not only superficial but rooted into greater depth.”

Using a combination of surveying methods – including ground penetration radar (GPR), seismic tomography, and archaeological excavations – the team says Gunung Padang is not just an artificial structure, but a series of several layers built over consecutive prehistoric periods.

The topmost, megalithic layer made up of rock columns, walls, paths, and spaces sit above a second layer some 1-3 metres below the surface.

The researchers suggest this second layer has previously been misinterpreted as natural rock formation but is actually another arrangement of columnar rocks organised in a matrix structure.

Below this, the third layer of arranged rocks – containing large underground cavities or chambers – extends as far as 15 metres deep, and this sits upon the lowest (fourth) layer, made of ‘lava tongue’ basalt rock, somehow modified or carved by human hands.

According to the researchers, preliminary radiocarbon dating suggests the first layer could be up to approximately 3,500 old years old, the second layer somewhere around 8,000 years old, and the third layer in the vicinity of 9,500 to 28,000 years old.

As for the purpose of these ancient, vast structures, the researchers – led by geophysicist Danny Hilman Natawidjaja from the Indonesian Institute of Sciences – suggest the ancient pyramid could have had a religious basis.

“It’s a unique temple,” Natawidjaja told Live Science.

For now, that’s speculation, but if the researchers’ other claims about the structures turn out to be right, it’s a major finding that could challenge notions of what prehistoric societies were capable of.

‘It’s huge,” Natawidjaja told The Sydney Morning Herald in 2013. ”People think the prehistoric age was primitive, but this monument proves that wrong.”

Still, not everybody is convinced. Natawidjaja’s research has been the subject of much controversy in Indonesia and elsewhere, with a large number of archaeologists and sceptics criticising the team’s methods and findings.

The latest research presentations – which, for now, remain non-peer-reviewed – will probably add fuel to the fire, but they also give the world a closer glimpse at what could be one of the world’s most ancient and mysterious structures.

As for what that structure really is, only time will tell.