The graves of the SeljukThe Anadolu Agency reports that the grave of Kilij Arslan I, a Seljuk sultan who reigned from A.D. 1092 to 1107, was discovered during investigations ahead of construction work in eastern Turkey by a team of researchers from Dicle University.
The team members also found the grave of the sultan’s daughter, Saide Hatun.
Sultan of Rum Kılıç Arslan I and his daughter Saide Hatun were uncovered in southeastern Diyarbakır province following a nine-day excavation.
The archaeological site of the graves of Seljuk Sultan of Rum Kılıç Arslan I and his daughter Saide Hatun in Diyarbakır, southeastern Turkey.
After conducting archival research, Dicle University (DÜ) established a commission to find Kılıç Arslan I’s grave in Diyarbakır. Headed by the vice-rector of DÜ, professor Ahmet Tanyıldız, the commission included professor Irfan Yıldız, associate professor Oktay Bozan, associate professor Aytaç Çoşkun and academic Salih Erpolat.
Taking into consideration all graveyards in the Silvan district of Diyarbakır, the commission focused its work on two gravesites in Orta Çeşme Park in line with the data obtained from their research. After nine days of work, the team uncovered the Seljuk sultan’s final resting place on Tuesday.
Speaking to reporters, DÜ Rector Mehmet Karakoç said they had been unable to pinpoint the exact location of the grave in the past but knew it was somewhere in the Silvan district.
“The discovery of the grave will bring a different perspective to historical events in terms of both Silvan and Diyarbakır’s history,” Karakoç said.
Coşkun noted that the team dug 2 meters deep (6.6 feet) across a 35-square-meter (42-square-yard) area during their work to find the grave.
“The area on which we work featured the grave of the most important ruler of the Sultanate of Rum. Therefore, we studiously sustained our work day and night,” he added.
Kılıç Arslan I succeeded Suleiman ibn Qutulmish, who founded the sultanate in 1092. As the second Anatolian Seljuk sultan, he was also the first Muslim commander to fight against the Crusaders. He defeated the Crusaders in three battles during the Crusade of 1101 and went on to conquer much of eastern Anatolia from the Danishmends.
4,000 Years old Anglo-Saxon Settlement and Cemetery Unearthed in England
The Northampton Chronicle & Echo reports that an Anglo-Saxon settlement and cemetery, and Bronze Age barrows and burials, were discovered in England’s East Midlands during an archaeological investigation conducted by researchers from the Museum of London Archaeology ahead of a development project.
Traces of more than 20 structures were unearthed at the Anglo-Saxon settlement site. Weapons, cosmetic kits, combs, thousands of beads, some 150 brooches, 75 wrist clasps, and 15 chatelaines were recovered from the more than 150 Anglo-Saxon burials.
The site was excavated as part of pre-construction planning requirements at Overstone Farm where Barratt and David Wilson homes intend to build two to five-bedroom homes, a school and amenities, as part of a new housing development.
Archaeologists uncovered the site during pre-construction planning requirements.
Jewellery, weapons and more were found.
An archaeology firm – Museum of London Archaeology (Mola) – was appointed and over the course of 12 months, the archaeologists undertook detailed excavation and recording across a total of 15 hectares.
The work revealed 154 Anglo-Saxon burials, many containing grave goods including weapons, beads and brooches. Simon Markus, project manager at MoLA, said: “The Overstone site contains by far the biggest Anglo-Saxon cemetery ever found in Northamptonshire.
Jewellery, weapons and more were found.
“It is also rare to find both an Anglo-Saxon settlement and a cemetery in a single excavation.
An overview of the site in Overstone.
An overview of the site in Overstone.
“The excavations will help us understand the way people lived in both the Anglo- Saxon period, around 1,500 years ago as well as the Bronze Age, nearly 4,000 years ago.
“The human remains will tell us about diet, health and even the origins of the people themselves whilst their buildings can teach us what their day-to-day lives were like and how they utilised the local landscape in these two different periods.”
Jewellery found on the site included roughly 150 brooches, 15 rings, 2,000 beads, 75 wrist clasps and 15 chatelaines – decorative belt hooks.
Other findings included weapons such as spears and shields and everyday items like cosmetic kits and combs.
The site also contains a previously unknown Anglo-Saxon settlement of 22 structures, with 20 more Anglo-Saxon buildings scattered around the site, together with earlier prehistoric evidence including three Bronze Age round barrows, 46 prehistoric burials, and four Bronze Age buildings.
John Dillion, managing director at Barratt and David Wilson Homes South Midlands, said: “We’re blown away by the findings at our site in Overstone and have enjoyed learning more about what the land was previously used for.
“It is amazing to think that settlers have been building homes on this site for around 4,000 years, and we hope to continue this long-standing tradition with our new and already flourishing community.”
All of the findings from the excavations have been removed from the site and are now being analysed by MOLA’s specialist teams.
The Unique Architectural Heritage Of Icelandic Turf Houses that Hidden In The Landscape
Memorable, popular, and rumored to be the inspiration for Tolkien’s hobbit holes, turf houses are a rare form of home for the people who live in difficult climates.
For millennia, they have existed, and although layouts and materials may have changed, the basic format remains the same wood and stone frames surrounded by the Icelandic landscape’s most plentiful material: turf. In Iceland, where turf houses were the most common housing as late as the 1960s, the structures were practical and well-suited for the difficult weather and lack of timber.
The people responsible for bringing the knowledge of turf houses were the very first settlers and themselves from another cold, difficult climate – the Vikings.
When the Vikings arrived in Iceland in 874 AD, it wasn’t as barren as it appears today – in fact, 25-40% of the island was covered in forest, mainly birch trees, though they were on the short side due to lack of light and low temperatures.
But the new inhabitants cleared the forests for sheep grazing, agriculture, shelter, and firewood. Tree regeneration was inhibited by all the grazing and thus, the Vikings deforested Iceland. So where did they get the wood for their houses after they used up the forest? Driftwood and shipwrecks made up the deficit.
The Vikings built communal longhouses, often sharing one large room with dozens of people and occasionally, animals. Body heat was a very important tool for not freezing to death during the long dark winter, so inhabitants slept all in the same room with two or more per bed.
Turf longhouses varied in size depending on the wealth of the farmer or clan, and occasionally outbuildings like sheds and privies were also built.
The building method is genius.
First, a hole was dug a few feet down to where the ground doesn’t freeze. Then a stone footprint was laid using the flattest stones possible – this kept the wood from touching the damp ground and helped prevent rot.
A wooden frame was then erected on top of the stone footprint; the posts and beams were held together using notches and pegs, and a mat of small branches was laid over the roof beams to create airflow between the beams and the turf.
The turf was cut directly out of the ground using special tools and laid out to dry; then the turf “bricks” – held together by the root mass of the plants therein – were laid in two courses around the wood frame, with dirt and gravel compacted between the layers.
Turf bricks also covered the roof at a steep angle to facilitate water runoff. The resulting walls were extremely thick and provided excellent insulation and surprising water-tightness.
Viking houses included some very interesting features, like elaborate carved front doors with complex locks and holes for shooting arrows at attackers, and a sleeping closet for the master of the house and his wife that locked from the inside for extra protection against invaders.
Archaeological evidence suggests that more than the longhouse was communal – the turf outhouses featured group seating!
While the Viking turf houses undoubtedly fared well against Iceland’s notorious cold, damp, and dark weather, they did have some downsides.
Mice and lice often lived in the turf, and very bad storms could sometimes peel up the roofs. Turf houses also required a lot of maintenance, and depending on the severity of the winter needed to be re-turfed every 20 or so years.
By the 14th century, Viking style longhouses had given way to smaller, specialized buildings that were connected by tunnels to conserve heat. By the late 18th century, the burstabær style was the most popular, introducing wooden ends, or a wooden face with the back built into the side of a hill.
Many houses in this style still stand and have become the iconic Icelandic turf house. They remained the most common form of housing in Iceland until the 20th century when urbanization and modernization took the country by storm. Within 30 years, Icelanders had made the change to modern houses and city living, and the last full-time residents of turf houses moved out in the 1960s.
Today you can visit several turf houses, most of which have been restored and incorporated into the National Museum of Iceland, though some families have privately restored their ancestral homes.
Inside The Turf House
Once a common skill, knowledge of turf house construction is now relegated to a handful of specialized craftsmen doing restoration and educational work.
But the influence of turf houses lives on: architecture firms in Iceland and abroad are rediscovering the appeal of the original “green” buildings, with their insulating properties and use of local materials. Besides being strong and practical, turf houses are cute – especially when the roofs are in bloom.
Manchester Victorian baths uncovered under the car park
Remnants from one of the earliest Victorian bathhouses have been unearthed beneath a car park. The “stunning” remains of Mayfield Baths, where mill workers took baths and washed their clothes, were found by archaeologists in Manchester.
The ornate tiles of the Mayfield baths, whose pools measured nearly 20 meters, were found in “stunning” condition beneath a car park 164 years after it opened.
The building, a grand Italianate design set in the heart of Manchester’s booming “Cottonopolis” district, was demolished after being bombed in the second world war but the remains of its swimming pools have been discovered by archaeologists from the University of Salford.
Archaeologist Steve Tamburello inspects segments of tiles from one of the pools that were part of Mayfield baths.
The bathhouse, which opened in 1857, was a vital public amenity that served generations of Mancunians, most of whom worked in the surrounding print and textiles factories.
The area behind Manchester Piccadilly station has mainly been derelict for years but is undergoing redevelopment as part of plans to build 1,500 homes, retail, leisure and office space, as well as a 6.5-acre park – the first in the city for 100 years. The redevelopment will also include a few new car parks to make up for the one that has been demolished, the plan is to have a bigger car park but only one of them that would serve the majority of the facilities in close proximity. It’s safe to say there are going to be many new line paint machines procured ready for the development of the new car park.
Graham Mottershead, the project manager at Salford Archaeology, said: “The Mayfield bathhouse is a fascinating example of the social and public health advancements that came about during the Industrial Revolution.
“As the city’s population boomed with factory workers, crowded and substandard living conditions gave rise to the spread of cholera and typhoid. For those living and working around Mayfield, the Mayfield baths would have been a vital source of cleanliness and hygiene.
The ornate tiles from the Mayfield baths will be preserved for future use, developers said.
“The sheer pace of change and innovation during the Industrial Revolution means many advancements were not recorded.
Excavations like this help us to learn a great deal about what is arguably the most important period of human history and, in the case of Mayfield, a location that is so very relevant to the heritage of the people of Manchester.”
The Mayfield Partnership, the public-private company behind the redevelopment, said it would preserve the ornate tiles from the bathhouse and use them in future.
It plans to name one of the new commercial buildings after George Poulton, who became famous in the 1850s as a promoter of public health at the Mayfield baths.
The remains, which were uncovered by painstaking hand-digging as well as machine excavation, will be used to form a detailed record of the bathhouse by combining the findings with historical documents and digital drawings.
300,000-Year-Old Wooden Throwing Stick Found in Germany
In Germany, a 300,000-year-old hunting stick able to kill big predators has been discovered. Used by the extinct human subspecies Homo heidelbergensis, the wooden throwing stick was capable of killing waterbirds and horses during the Ice Age.
It was achieved by conducting trials and looking at what would strike the target at full height, with the length of the throwing stick being 25 inches, and the speed of 98 feet (30 metres) per second.
German researchers have said the weapon was thrown like a boomerang, with one sharp side and one flat side, and spun powerfully around a centre of gravity.
The new throwing stick in situ at the time of discovery. The maker of the throwing stick used stone tools to cut the branches flush and then to smooth the surface of the artefact
But when in flight, the weapon, also referred to as ‘rabbit stick’ or ‘killing stick’, did not return to the thrower.
Instead, the rotation helped to maintain a straight, accurate trajectory which increased the likeliness of striking prey.
Picture of throwing stick from Schöningen, Lower Saxony, Germany, with four views and engravings
‘They are effective weapons over different distances, among other things when hunting water birds,’ said Dr Jordi Serangeli, professor at the Institute for Prehistory, Early History and Medieval Archaeology at the University of Tübingen in Germany.
‘Bones of swans and ducks are well documented from the find layer.
‘In addition, it is likely that larger mammals, such as horses that were often hunted on the shores of Lake Schöningen, were startled and driven in a certain direction with the throwing stick.’
Hunters on the Schöningen lakeshore likely used the throwing stick to hunt waterbirds
Researchers uncovered the weapon during an archaeological excavation at the Schöningen mine in Lower Saxony, northern Germany. Schöningen has yielded by far the largest and most important record of wooden tools and hunting equipment from the Paleolithic,’ said Professor Nicholas Conard, founding director of the Institute of Archaeological Sciences at the University of Tübingen.
Detailed analysis by the researchers showed how the maker of this type of throwing stick used stone tools to cut the branches flush and then smooth the surface. The stick, carved from spruce wood, is around 25 inches (64.5cm) long, just over 1 inch (2.9cm) in diameter and weighs 264 grams.
This weapon also had fractures and damage consistent with that found on similar experimental examples.
For the first time, researchers say the study provides clear evidence of the function of such a weapon.
Late Lower Palaeolithic hominins in Northern Europe were ‘highly effective hunters’ with a wide array of wooden weapons that are rarely preserved, they say.
‘300,000 years ago, hunters had used different high-quality weapons such as throwing sticks, javelins and thrust lances in combination,’ said Professor Conard.
Researchers attribute the discovery to the ‘outstanding’ preservation of wooden artefacts in the water-saturated lakeside sediments in Schöningen.
‘The chances of finding Paleolithic artefacts made of wood are normally zero.
‘Only thanks to the fabulously good conservation conditions in water-saturated lakeside sediments in Schöningen can we document the evolution of hunting and the varied use of wooden tools.’ The discovery has been detailed further in Nature Ecology & Evolution.
Forget everything you know about the most famous painting in the world: Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa (1503–17). According to French scientist Pascal Cotte, who has analyzed the painting by reflecting light technology for over 10 years, the Mona Lisa hides another portrait underneath.
According to the BBC, the most surprising of Cotte’s findings is that the sitter in the original painting found underneath has no trace of the enigmatic smile that elevated da Vinci’s portrait to the category of myth.
The sitter is also looking off to the side, rather than towards the viewer like the Mona Lisa we know and love today.
Light technology was used on the famous painting
Cotte’s pioneering technology is called Layer Amplification Method (LAM) and has allowed him to make a slew of groundbreaking discoveries. It works by projecting a series of intense lights onto an artwork while a camera measures the reflections.
Last year, he already made waves among the art historical community when he revealed that another da Vinci masterpiece, Lady With an Ermine (1489–90) was painted not in one, but in three clearly differentiated stages.
Pascal Cotte. On the left is a digital reconstruction of what he claims to have found underneath the Mona Lisa.
“The LAM technique gives us the capability to peel the painting like an onion, removing the surface to see what’s happening inside and behind the different layers of paint,” he told the BBC back then.
Crucially, this “new” Mona Lisa has ramifications also in terms of the identity of the sitter. For years and years, it’s been debated whether the woman in the painting might have been Lisa Gherardini, the wife of a Florentine silk merchant, da Vinci’s mother, or even a Chinese slave.
Cotte, complicating things even further, told the BBC: “When I finished the reconstruction of Lisa Gherardini, I was in front of the portrait and she is totally different from Mona Lisa today. This is not the same woman.”
Not everyone agrees with Cotte, however. Da Vinci expert Martin Kemp, Emeritus Professor of the History of Art at the University of Oxford, told the BBC: [Cotte’s images] are ingenious in showing what Leonardo may have been thinking about.
But the idea that there is that picture as it was hiding underneath the surface is untenable. I do not think there are these discreet stages that represent different portraits. I see it as more or less a continuous process of evolution. I am absolutely convinced that the Mona Lisa is Lisa.”
Cotte’s findings will be presented in a documentary called The Secrets of the Mona Lisa that will be broadcast on BBC Two.
The famous art historian Andrew Graham-Dixon, who’s behind the documentary, said of the discovery: “I have no doubt that this is definitely one of the stories of the century.”
This could be the second claim in less than two weeks that changes common perspectives on celebrated artworks by da Vinci.
In late November, the notorious British art forger Shaun Greenhalgh publicly claimed to be the author of La Bella Principessa, a $150 million painting attributed to Leonardo da Vinci.
A $26M Cimabue masterpiece was found in an elderly woman’s kitchen
A missing masterpiece of the 13th century was sold for nearly 24.2 million Euros (26.8 million dollars), just months after it was found hanging in a French kitchen. “Christ Mocked,” by the Florentine painter Cimabue, sold for more than four times the pre-sale estimate at an auction in Senlis, north of Paris, on Sunday.
“The Mocking of Christ,” believed to be by the late 13th-century Florentine artist Cenni di Pepo, also known as Cimabue.
An elderly French woman from the town of Compiegne had kept the rare artwork — which she thought was a Greek religious icon — in her kitchen.
The unsuspecting owner did not know where the 10-inch by 8-inch painting had come from, according to Jerome Montcouquil of art specialists Cabinet Turquin, which was asked to carry out tests on the painting following its discovery in the summer.
“It didn’t take long for us to see that it was an artwork by Italian painter Cimabue,” he told CNN prior to the sale. “He’s a father of painting so we know his work very well.”
Cimabue is the pseudonym of artist Cenni di Pepo, born in Florence around the year 1240. He is known to have been the discoverer and master of Giotto, widely regarded as one of the greatest artists of the pre-Renaissance era.
“There are only 11 of his paintings in the world — they are rare,” Montcouquil said.
Montcouquil said the work is part of a diptych made in 1280 when the artist painted eight scenes centered on the passion and crucifixion of Christ.
The style of painting, its gold background, and traces of its old frame helped experts identify the artwork as part of the triptych, according to a press release published by auctioneers Acteon ahead of the sale.
‘Lost’ Caravaggio valued at $170M bought just before the auction The pictorial layer remains in “excellent condition” despite accumulating dust, continued the release.
The National Gallery in London is home to another scene from the work, “The Virgin and Child with Two Angels,” which the gallery acquired in 2000. It had been lost for centuries, before a British aristocrat found it in his ancestral home in Suffolk, according to AFP.
The “Apollo and Venus” painting by 16th-century Dutch master Otto van Veen (1556-1629) was discovered in the closet of an art gallery in Iowa and is likely worth over $4 million.
The “Apollo and Venus” painting by 16th-century Dutch master Otto van Veen (1556-1629) was discovered in the closet of an art gallery in Iowa and is likely worth over $4 million.
“They are all made with the same technique on the same wood panel so you can follow the grain of the wood through the different scenes,” said Montcouquil.
“We also used infrared light to be sure the painting was done by the same hand. You can even see the corrections he made.”
The painting had been hanging above a hot plate used for cooking food, according to AFP. Montcouquil said it was the first-ever Cimabue painting to be auctioned.
Prehistoric teeth fossils dating back 9.7 million years ‘could rewrite human history’
In Southwestern Germany, a team of researchers discovered teeth that were millions of years old and presumably belonged to an ancient Euro-Asian primate last September. Yet after the discovery was made public, controversy opened up about the interpretation of our earliest existence.
News of the sensational discovery was only made public recently since the team who dug up the ancient teeth in the town of Eppelsheim wanted to be sure the find was as significant as they had initially believed.
“It’s completely new to science, and it is a big surprise because nobody had expected such a tremendous, extremely rare discovery,” Herbert Lutz, head of the excavation team at the Natural History Museum in Mainz, told Deutsche Welle.
Lutz had been digging at the site in Eppelsheim for 17 years where the Rhine River used to flow, excavating riverbed sediments approximately 10 million years old. the area is “well known in science” and famous for its primate fossils.
At the end of 2016, as his team decided to finally wrap up the excavation, “just in the last second, these two teeth came to light. We really weren’t expecting such a tremendous discovery,” Lutz said.
The excavation site in Eppelsheim.
Both teeth are completely preserved, too. The teeth look “excellent” and are “shining like amber,” though no longer white, Lutz said.
The 9.7 million-year-old canine tooth and upper molar – found only 60 centimeters apart and thus believed to belong together – resemble those of great apes who lived in Africa 2.9 to 4.4 million years ago. According to Lutz and his colleagues, the teeth closely resemble some extinct African relatives of humans.
Molar (left) and canine (right) fossils found in Germany raise questions about human history. Credit: Naturhistorisches Museum Mainz
Since the official unveiling of the teeth, global media outlets have been questioning whether the find is capable of rewriting human history since it seems to go against theories of human beings originating from Africa.
The teeth are unlike anything found in Europe and Asia, Lutz cautiously claims.
“It’s a complete mystery where this individual came from, and why nobody’s ever found a tooth like this somewhere before,” he said in an interview with Research Gate.
But some experts say that the teeth hardly “force us to reexamine the theory that humans originated from Africa,” arguing that the fossils “more likely belonged to a very distant branch on the primate family tree,” reported National Geographic.
Other experts state that whether the teeth really belong to the hominoid classification (apes, chimpanzees, etc.) is questionable.
Expert on the teeth of humans’ extinct relatives and paleoanthropologist at the University of Toronto, Bence Viola, says the molar found contradicts any case for a human connection.
“I think this is much ado about nothing,” he told National Geographic. “The molar, which they say clearly comes from the same individual, is absolutely not a hominin, and I would say also not a hominoid.”
The majority of the experts National Geographic spoke to said the molar found likely belongs to a species of an extinct, primitive branch of primates that lived in Asia and Europe between seven and 17 million years ago.
