Women buried with thick, twisted bronze neck rings and buckets on their feet found in Ukraine
Archaeologists discovered the remains of men buried with weapons such as axes, spearheads, and swords, and women buried with thick twisted bronze neck rings in an 11th-century cemetery near the village of Ostriv, south of Kiev, Ukraine.
Researchers Vsevolod Ivakin and Vyacheslav Baranov presented their study of the remains at the Archaeological Institute of America, which was held Jan. 4-7 in Chicago, according to Live Science.
In 2017, the Ukrainian Institute of Archaeology conducted an expedition that discovered the Ostriv graveyard. Between 2017 and 2022, excavations uncovered 107 inhumation burials from the late 10th and 11th centuries.
The graves’ uniqueness was quickly apparent. Unlike the unusual funerary practices of the Kyivan Rus during this period, the graves were facing south and west rather than north.
The deceased were laid in supine position (on their backs), with outstretched limbs. In most of the graves, there were remnants of wooden coffins. The remains of funerary food offerings (chicken bones and eggshells) were discovered in the graves and in wooden buckets at the feet of some of the deceased.
Some people were buried with extremely valuable items, including slate spindle whorls, jewelry such as bronze neck rings and bracelets, pennanular brooches, cast bronze belt rings, cowrie shell bead necklaces, and weapons such as battle axes, knives, and spearheads.
The skeleton of a woman was buried with elaborate neck rings as well as rings around her arms.
Though the comparison was not exact, the orientation and funerary furnishings bore a strong resemblance to the practices of tribes in the Western Baltic.
Most remarkably, none of the Ostriv graves were cremation burials; the Western Baltic peoples generally burned their dead. Furthermore, Baltic funeral customs do not generally involve buckets.
Archaeologists hypothesize that these key differences may be attributed to restrictions placed on traditional funerary practices by the Christian dukes of Kyiv, primarily Volodymyr the Great (r. 980-1015) and Yaroslav the Wise (r. 1019-1054), and by the process of Christianization of the Baltic settlers of the region during the 11th century.
A stone altar found in the cemetery could have been used for Christian or pagan rituals, or a mixture of the two.
Research continued at the site until 2022 but the excavation has been paused due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Archaeologists discover complete armored 14th-century gauntlet in Switzerland
Excavations in Kyburg in the canton of Zürich, northeastern Switzerland have discovered a 14th-century fully preserved gauntlet of armor in exceptional condition.
Only five 14th-century gauntlets have been discovered in Switzerland thus far, according to the Zurich cantonal infrastructure department on Tuesday.
However, their state of preservation is nowhere near that of the glove discovered in Kyburg. All the iron parts of this one have been found, and some of the fingers are even completely free of corrosion and look as good as new.
The metal parts of the glove were originally riveted to a leather glove. The 25 pieces were also firmly attached to each other, giving the glove great flexibility.
The entire gauntlet measures more than 14 inches long. Individual iron plates overlap like scales and are connected by side rivets. Originally, they would have been riveted to a leather or fabric material before being sewn onto a leather or textile glove. The small plates and flexible underlayers allowed the wearer to comfortably grip a sword and make a fist.
The castle is first mentioned in 1027 under the name of Chuigeburg (“cows-fort”), which name points to an original use as a refuge castle for livestock.
The first fortification at this site was likely built in the second half of the 10th century by the counts of Winterthur.
The early castle was destroyed in 1028 or 1030 by Emperor Conrad II. It was rebuilt and soon became the center of the county of Kyburg which was formed in 1053 as a possession of the counts of Dillingen.
The right glove is completely preserved. At least individual parts of the left one were recovered.
Cantonal archaeologists excavated a site southeast of the castle in the winter of 2021/22 in a rescue operation before constructing a home with a basement.
Archaeologists discovered a medieval weaving cellar that had burned down in the 14th century. Forging may also have taken place in its immediate vicinity; in addition to a casting mold, the archaeologists also discovered over 50 well-preserved metal objects such as hammers, keys, and projectile points – as well as the glove.
Archaeologists also found a completely preserved 14th-century gauntlet, in addition to fragments of its counterpart worn on the other hand.
It is not yet known who the glove belonged to, or why this type of object is so rarely found. Scientific work must now establish whether armour gloves were so rare at the time or whether they were melted down.
A copy of this armour glove will be on display at Kyburg Castle from the end of March as part of its permanent exhibition, complemented by a reconstruction of the rest of the armour. The original will be on display for three weeks in September.
The remnants of a Bronze Age tomb once thought to have been destroyed and lost to history have been discovered in County Kerry on the Atlantic coast of Ireland.
The tomb, known locally as Altóir na Gréine – the sun altar – stood for approximately 4,000 years on a hill outside the village of Ballyferriter on the Dingle peninsula before vanishing in the mid-19th century.
1838 sketch drawing of wedge tomb by Lady Chatterton.
Georgiana Chatterton, an English aristocrat and traveller, had visited the site and sketched the monument in 1838, but 14 years later an antiquarian named Richard Hitchcock reported that it had been broken up and carried away, presumably for building purposes.
The tomb raiders, it turns out, were not so thorough.
Billy Mag Fhloinn, a folklorist who is part of an archaeological mapping project, recently visited and filmed the site. When converting the video into a 3D scan he noticed that a stone in the undergrowth resembled one from Lady Chatterton’s Victorian-era sketch.
He sent the material to the National Monuments Service in Dublin, which dispatched archaeologist Caimin O’Brien, who confirmed it belonged to a so-called wedge tomb dating from the early bronze age between 2500BC and 2000 BC.
There is a capstone and several large upright stones called orthostats, comprising about a quarter of the original tomb, Mag Fhloinn said on Thursday. “People had assumed it was all destroyed.”
The tomb will now be added to the database of national monuments.
Ireland has several hundred wedge tombs, used by bronze age peoples to inter bodies and for ceremonies.
“Most point west or south-west towards the setting sun, so they may be tied into their broader cosmological understanding of the world,” said Mag Fhloinn.
It remains unclear who broke up the tomb, or why. “In the 19th century, there was quite a taboo about the destruction of these sites – it was said it would bring bad luck or disaster,” said Mag Fhloinn.
He is part of a tomb-mapping project run by Sacred Heart University, a US institution with a campus in Dingle.
“The significance of the rediscovery of the wedge tomb is to bring it back into the archaeological record so that the archaeological community can study it,” O’Brien told RTÉ, which first reported the discovery.
“For the first time in over 180 years, archaeologists know where the tomb is situated and it will enhance our understanding of wedge tomb distribution.”
Tony Bergin, president of the Kerry Archaeological and Historical Society, said it was an exciting discovery.
“There is a theory that this specific type of tomb links into a people who carried out copper mining,” he said. “There is also a comparison to similar-type tombs found in Brittany in France.”
A 2,700-Year-Old Temple Discovered on the Greek Island of Evia
An aerial view of the horseshoe-shaped altar located inside the temple.
Archaeologists in Greece have discovered a 2,700-year-old temple that houses a horseshoe-shaped altar overflowing with offerings.
Constructed of bricks, the temple is 100 feet (30 meters) long and is located next to the Temple of Amarysia Artemis, a sanctuary dedicated to the Greek goddess Artemis, which researchers found in 2017 on the island of Evia, according to a translated statement from Greece’s Ministry of Culture.
During excavations in 2023, archaeologists found the second temple.
“One of the peculiarities of this temple is the significant number of structures found inside it,” the researchers wrote on Jan. 9 in a translated Facebook post detailing their findings.
Those structures included several hearths located in the temple’s nave, including the ash-caked altar stacked with offerings such as pottery; vases; Corinthian alabaster, or the carved mineral gypsum; gold and silver jewelry studded with coral and amber; amulets; and bronze and iron fittings. The altar also contained several pieces of charred bone.
Archaeologists unearthed several bronze figurines shaped like bulls and a ram as well as a bull’s head made of clay.
Some of the pottery pieces predate the newfound temple and were fired during the late eighth century B.C., leading researchers to suspect that the altar may have once resided outside the temple and was later moved indoors.
In the sixth century B.C., brick partitions were placed at the sanctuary’s heart for added support, leading researchers to think that the temple was “partially destroyed” by a fire, according to the statement.
Under the temple, archaeologists found several dry stone walls from a different building that once stood at the site, along with several bronze figurines shaped like bulls and rams.
They also unearthed remnants of buildings from the eighth and ninth centuries B.C. next to the first temple, as well as a fortification system dating to the more recent early Copper Age, or roughly 4000 to 3500 B.C.
Iron Age Celtic Woman Wearing Fancy Clothes Buried in This ‘Tree Coffin’ in Switzerland
THE ANCIENT corpse of a woman buried in a hollowed-out tree has been found in Switzerland. It’s believed the woman, who died 2,200 years ago, commanded great respect in her tribe, as she was buried in fine clothes and jewellery.
The ancient corpse of a woman buried in a hollowed out tree in Zurich, Switzerland. Pictured are parts of her remains including her skull (top), as well as her jewellery (blue, bottom)Credit: Zurich archaeology department
Scientists say the woman was Celtic. The Iron Age Celts are known to have buried members of their tribe in “tree coffins” buried deep underground.
The woman’s remains were found in the city of Zurich in 2017, according to Live Science.
An analysis carried out by the city’s archaeology department shows she was around 40 years old when she died in 200 BC.
Her bones suggest she did little manual labour during her lifetime, suggesting she was someone of importance.
Artist’s impression of the woman in her coffin. The coffin was made out of a hollowed tree trunkCredit: Zurich archaeology department
And here’s how they found itCredit: Zurich archaeology department
“A specialist determined the order of the layers of clothing on the basis of the textile, fur and leather scraps preserved in the grave,” a statement said.
“So the woman wore probably a dress made of fine sheep’s wool, about another woolen cloth and a coat of sheepskin.”
Her jewellery consisted of bronze bracelets, a delicate bronze belt and a stunning necklace strung with amber and glass beads.
And of particular interest to scientists was the clasp on the woman’s necklace.
Both ends of the bling had a clip known as a brooch that allowed the woman to string blue and yellow beads onto it.
Jewellery buried with the womanCredit: Zurich archaeology department
A necklace found in the coffinCredit: Zurich archaeology department
It’s been proposed the woman may have known a Celtic man who was buried about 260 feet from her grave.
He was found buried with a sword, shield and lance. The pair were buried in the same decade.
The Celts are most commonly associated with Britain, but actually stretched as far as modern day Turkey.
They were renowned for being fierce fighters – the conquering Romans built Hadrian’s Wall to protect themselves from the Celts who had fled north.
This 48-Million-Year-Old Fossil Has an Insect Inside a Lizard Inside a Snake
Palaeontologists have uncovered a fossil that has preserved an insect inside a lizard inside a snake – a prehistoric battle of the food chain that ended in a volcanic lake some 48 million years ago.
Pulled from an abandoned quarry in southwest Germany called the Messel Pit, the fossil is only the second of its kind ever found, with the remains of three animals sitting snug in one another.
“It’s probably the kind of fossil that I will go the rest of my professional life without ever encountering again, such is the rarity of these things,” palaeontologist Krister Smith from Germany’s Senckenberg Institute told Michael Greshko at National Geographic. “It was pure astonishment.”
Smith and his team suspect that the iguana ate a shiny insect meal, and then two days later was swallowed headfirst by a juvenile snake.
It’s unclear how the snake ultimately died, but what we do know is it got too close to the deep volcanic lake that once bubbled in the Messel Pit, and was either poisoned or suffocated by the toxic fumes.
Its corpse likely slid into the lake after death, where the Russian doll of skeletons was preserved perfectly for millions of years.
Rare ‘Nesting Doll’ Fossil Uncovers Beetle in Lizard in Snake. Snake with lizard and beetle: The rare tripartite fossil food chain from the Messel Pit.
A beetle inside a reptile inside a snake.
“To see this kind of trophic scale recorded within the gut of a snake is a very cool thing,” UK palaeontologist Jason Head from the University of Cambridge, who wasn’t involved with the study, told National Geographic.
While the combination of snake-lizard-bug is entirely unique in the fossil record, this isn’t the first time a prehistoric turducken has been discovered.
Back in 2008, Austrian researchers found a 250-million-year-old fossil that had preserved a shark that had eaten some kind of amphibian that had eaten a small fish.
It’s far more fragmentary than the Messel Pit fossil, but it was the first real indication that the food web of the time was far more complex than researchers had thought.
If anywhere is likely to be harbouring more of these types of fossils, it’s the Messel Pit, which in the past has served up the now notorious Darwinius masillae fossil, a fossilised beetle with its turquoise iridescence largely intact, and two turtles caught in the middle of doing, erm, turtle things…
The best-preserved fossils in the world from the Eocene epoch, which ran from around 56 to 34 million years ago, have been found here, and Smith and his team are already planning another trip back.
“This fossil is amazing,” says one of the researchers, Agustín Scanferla. “We were lucky men to study this kind of specimen.”
The find has been published in Palaeobiodiversity and Palaeoenvironments.
3,000-Year-Old Castle Built by Mysterious Civilization Found at The Bottom of a Lake in Turkey
Underwater ruins of Armenian castle in lake Van ( Anadolu Ajansı )
A team of Turkish archaeologists has discovered the remains of what is believed to be a 3,000-year-old castle from the Armenian kingdom of Urartu (Ararat) submerged underwater in Lake Van.
The underwater excavations were led by Van Yüzüncü Yıl University and the governorship of Turkey’s eastern Bitlis Province. The castle is said to belong to the Iron Age Armenian civilization also known as the Kingdom of Van, Urartu, Ararat, and Armenia.
The lake itself is believed to have been formed by a crater caused by a volcanic eruption of Mount Nemrut near the province of Van. The current water level of the reservoir is about 150 meters higher than it was during the Iron Age.
“Civilizations living around the lake set up large villages and settlements while the water level of the lake was low, but they had to leave the area after it increased again,”
said Tahsin Ceylan, one of the researchers of the newspaper.
The researchers are expecting to conduct further excavations to reveal the full scale of this discovery. The discovery is expected to attract tourism.
Although now within the borders of the Republic of Turkey, the Lake, and town of Van is the very heartland of Armenian civilization since times immemorial. In fact, so much so, that it is considered the very place where Armenian ethnic identity was first born. According to the records of the 5th-century Armenian historian Movses of Khorene, Hayk (the legendary founder of the Armenian nation) settled near Lake Van in 2492 BC where he first founded the village of Haykashen and build there the mighty fortress of Haykaberd.
At the very shores of Lake, Van Hayk assembled his army and told them that they must defeat the Babylonian tyrant king Bel who had marched against him and his people, or die trying to do so, rather than become his slaves. At Dyutsaznamart (meaning: “Battle of Giants”) near Lake Van, Hayk finally defeated Bel. Hereafter Hayk named the region where the battle took place after his own name and the site of the battle Hayots Dzor (meaning: “Valley of the Armenians”). Thus the Armenian nation and its first free kingdom were born on the very shores of Lake Van after which the Armenians call themselves ‘Hay’ and their country – ‘Hayk’ or ‘Hayastan’, in honor of the legendary founder Hayk.
The ancient Hittite inscriptions deciphered in the 1920s by the Swiss scholar Emil Forrer testify to the existence of a mountain country called ‘Hayasa’ and its vessel lying around Lake Van. The Annals of Mursili (14th century BC) describes the campaigns of Mursili against Hayasa:
And when I arrived in Tiggaramma, the chief cup-bearer Nuvanza and all the noblemen came to meet me at Tiggaramma. I should have marched to Hayasa still, but the chiefs said to me, ‘The season is now far advanced, Sire, Lord! Do not go to Hayasa.’ And I did not go to Hayasa.
Map of historic Armenian with Lake Van at its center. (from Encyclopædia Britannica Online)
It was exactly the works of Movses of Khorene that led to the initial discovery of the Armenian kingdom of Van (Urartu). The existence of this kingdom was unknown to science until the year 1823 when a French scholar, J. Saint-Martin, chanced upon a passage in the ‘History of Armenia’ by Movses of Khorene who had recorded the kingdom in great detail. Inspired by these writings Jean Saint-Martin sent a team to the described location and discovered a kingdom completely unknown to Western academia at the time.
Khorenatsi had described the ancient settlements in Van and attributed them to one of the descendants of Hayk; Ara the Beautiful son of Aram. His description exactly matched, the later discovered, Assyrian clay tablet attributing the foundation of the kingdom to the first king of Urartu; King Aram (c. 860 – 843 BC).
“Urartian history is part of Armenian history, in the same sense that the history of the ancient Britons is part of English history, and that of the Gauls is part of French history. Armenians can legitimately claim, through Urartu, an historical continuity of some 4000 years; their history is among those of the most ancient peoples in the world.”
– Mack Chahin, The Kingdom of Armenia, A History, 1987, revised in 2001
The lake was the center of the Armenian kingdom of Ararat from about 1000 BC, afterward of the Satrapy of Armenia, Kingdom of Greater Armenia, and the Armenian Kingdom of Vaspurakan. Along with Lake Sevan in today’s Armenia and Lake Urmia in today’s Iran, Lake Van was one of the three great lakes of the Armenian Kingdom, referred to as the Seas of Armenia. Its name “Van” is one of the ancient Armenian words for “town” which is still reflected in many Armenian toponyms such as Nakhichevan (meaning: “place/town of descend”), Stepananvan (meaning: “town of Stepan”), Vanadzor (meaning: “valley of Van” ), Sevan, and even the capitol city of Armenia; Yerevan.
Lake Van and its adjacent town also named Van is today part of Turkey, however, its historic Armenian traces are still visible. At the very center of this lake, there is an island called Akhtamar that still holds a thousand-year-old Armenian church; the Cathedral of the Holy Cross.
Armenians lived in Van up until the early 20th century when Armenians were prosecuted by the Ottoman Turks during the Armenian Genocide. One of the last stands of the Armenian people known as the Resistance of Van, where over 55,000 Armenian civilians were massacred by Ottoman militias and bandits, was extensively discussed in newspapers of that time around the world.
The resistance occupies a significant place in Armenian national identity because it symbolizes the Armenians’ will to resist annihilation at the very heartland of the Armenian people.
General view of Akdamar (Akhtamar) Island and the Armenian cathedral of the Holy cross (915 AD).
Medieval Armenian gravestones, Lake Van.
An early 20th century picture of the 10th century Armenian monastery of Narekavank, which once stood near the southeastern shore of the lake.
Archaeologists discover almost complete 300,000-year-old elephant skeleton
This is how the ancient humans may have discovered the elephant’s carcass on a lake shore at what is now Schöningen, Germany.
Archaeologists have discovered the nearly complete skeleton of an enormous, now-extinct elephant that lived about 300,000 years ago in what is now the northern German town of Schöningen, according to new research.
Although this elephant — the Eurasian straight-tusked elephant (Palaeoloxodon antiquus) — likely died of old age, meat-eaters promptly devoured it; bite marks on its bones suggest that carnivores feasted on the dead beast, and flint flakes and bone tools found near the elephant indicate that humans scavenged whatever was left, the researchers said.
“The Stone Age hunters probably cut meat, tendons, and fat from the carcass,” project researcher Jordi Serangeli, head of the excavation in Schöningen, said in a statement.
The elephant died on the western side of a vast lake, a hint that it perished from natural causes.
“Elephants often remain near and in water when they are sick or old,” Ivo Verheijen, a doctoral student in archaeozoology and paleontology at the University of Tübingen, said in the statement. In addition, the elephant, a female, had worn teeth, suggesting it was old when it died, he said.
This 3D image was created by stitching together 500 individual photos that were taken of the straight-tusked elephant.
The remains from the front part of the elephant’s body are shown here.
Excavator Martin Kursch uncovers one of the elephant’s feet.
The excavation site in Schöningen, Germany
Image Gallery
Researchers have found the remains of at least 10 elephants dating to the Lower Paleolithic — also known as the Old Stone Age (about 3 million to 300,000 years ago) — over the past several years at Schöningen. But this new find is by far the most complete. The remains include 7.5-foot-long (2.3 meters) tusks — which are 125% longer than the average 6-foot-long (1.8 m) tusk of a modern African elephant, according to Encyclopedia Britannica.
The researchers also found the complete lower jaw, numerous vertebrae and ribs, large bones from three of its four legs, and all five of its delicate hyoid bones, which are found in the neck and help support the tongue and voice box.
This P. antiquus elephant had a shoulder height of about 10.5 feet (3.2 m) and would have weighed about 7.5 tons (6.8 metric tons). “It was therefore larger than today’s African elephant cows,” Verheijen said.
Near these remains, researchers found 30 small flint flakes and two long bone tools. Micro flakes embedded in these two bones suggest the ancient humans who scavenged the elephant used them to sharpen stone tools (called knapping) at the site, said project researcher Bárbara Rodríguez Álvarez, an archaeologist at the University of Tübingen.
Of note, the ancient humans who likely scavenged the elephant were not Homo sapiens. The earliest evidence of H. sapiens in Europe dates to about 45,000 years ago, according to excavations at a cave in Bulgaria, a study published last week in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution found. Instead, these human scavengers were likely H. heidelbergensis, an extinct human relative who lived about 700,000 to 200,000 years ago, the researchers in Germany said.
Wildlife watering hole
The lake was a popular hole for elephants, according to several of their preserved footprints just 330 feet (100 m) from the new elephant excavation site.
“A small herd of adults and younger animals must have passed through,” Flavio Altamura, a researcher at the Department of Antiquities at Sapienza University in Rome, said in the statement. “The heavy animals were walking parallel to the lakeshore. Their feet sank into the mud, leaving behind circular tracks.”
These elephants would have lived in a comfortable climate, comparable to today’s; about 300,000 years ago, Europe was in the Reinsdorf interglacial, a warmer period bookended by two glacial (or colder) periods. Other animals thrived there, too. About 20 kinds of large animals lived around the lake, including lions, bears, saber-toothed cats, rhinoceroses, wild horses, deer, and large cattle, according to excavations. “The wealth of wildlife was similar to that of modern Africa,” Serangeli said.
All of these animals attracted ancient human hunters. Archaeologists have found the remains of 10 wooden spears and one throwing stick from 300,000 years ago, according to a study published online on April 20 in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution.
The new finding was uncovered in a collaborative effort between the Senckenberg Centre for Human Evolution and Palaeoenvironment at the University of Tübingen in Germany and the Lower Saxony State Office for Heritage. The research will be published in the magazine “Archäologie in Deutschland” (Archaeology in Germany) and was presented at a press conference in Schöningen on May 19.
