Skull found in Turkey with neat hole may have been the work of mystics
Trepanated skull of a woman-Tumb 3 Corseaux-En Seyton-on display 6, Cantonal Museum of Archeology and History.
A 3,200-year-old skull was recently uncovered in Turkey’s eastern Van province. This find was made even more intriguing by the skull’s clearly man-made triangle-shaped hole, indicating that the deceased owner had undergone an ancient medical procedure now called trepanation.
Trepanation, a procedure that involves drilling a hole into the patient’s skull, is one of the oldest known surgical procedures in human history and a practice used by ancient humans all over the world. Archaeologists have found trepanned skulls in Europe, the Americas, Africa and China.
Skull-drilling in the 21st century
The practice is still used today to treat subdural hematomas, but surgeons have refined the process and now refer to it as a craniotomy or a burr hole.
Burr holes tend to be used in emergency situations after a traumatic head injury to relieve pressure due to fluid buildup in the skull which puts undue pressure on brain tissue. Craniotomies, per the National Cancer Institute, resemble ancient trepanation more so than burr holes; the surgeon removes a small piece of the skull in order to gain access to the brain.
This is sometimes used to relieve pressure, but can also be used to remove a tumor or a tissue sample, as well as to repair a skull fracture or brain aneurysm (a bulge in a blood vessel wall).
Unlike in ancient trepanation practices, modern surgeons nearly always replace the removed piece of the skull once they have finished their procedure.
Detail from The Extraction of the Stone of Madness, a painting by Hieronymus Bosch depicting trepanation (c.1488–1516).
What was the practice used for in ancient times?
According to the science news website Live Science, trepanation was used in ancient times to treat head injuries and pain, and some scientists believe it was used to ritually remove evil spirits from the body.
A 2013 article published in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology concluded that often, patients did survive the procedure and would heal after surgery. Researchers found scarring from trepanation, but the injury to the skull had healed.
Researchers have not yet determined whether the skull found recently in Turkey belonged to a survivor or a victim of trepanation. They also do not yet know – and perhaps never will find out – whether the procedure was performed in order to treat a medical issue or exorcise demons.
A large hall from the time of Viking Harald Bluetooth discovered
A large hall from the reign of King Harald Bluetooth of Norway was unearthed during housing construction work near Hune, a village in the Jammerbugt Municipality of North Jutland, Denmark.
The hall was up to 40 meters long and 8-10 meters wide, with 10-12 oak posts supporting the roof. They are rectangular in cross-section and measure up to 90×50 cm.
The hall probably served as a crucial location for political gatherings, for hosting visitors, and as the hub of social activity in the community’s social life.
Preliminary dating places the hall in the last half of the ninth century or the very first part of the eleventh century, but it was probably in use during the reign of Harald Bluetooth.
A rune stone near the excavation site has a date that fits this time frame. The stone, which dates from between 970 and 1020, is located in Hune Kirke and is inscribed with the words “Hove, Thorkild, and Thorbjrn set their father Runulv den Rdnilde’s stone.”
A rune stone near the excavation site.
The hall’s design is reminiscent of structures found at Harald Bluetooth’s ring castles, including Fyrkat at Hobro and Aggersborg at Aggersund.
The researchers have only excavated a portion of the hall, but they believe that additional buildings and features lie beneath the surface to the east of the hall, as buildings of this type rarely stand alone.
Thomas Rune Knudsen, from North Jutland Museums said: “This is the largest Viking Age find of this nature in more than ten years, and we have not seen anything like it before here in North Jutland.”
Excavations will resume in the New Year, with a Carbon-14 analysis on organic remains for more accurate dating, the results of which are expected to be published by the end of 2023.
King Harald Bluetooth, a Viking-born king who turned his back on old Norse religion and converting to Christianity. He is noted for bringing Christianity to Denmark and earned the nickname Blåtand (meaning blue tooth) because of a dead tooth that is said to have been dark blue.
Saint Anthony of Padua revealed in stunning facial approximation
A team of international researchers has revealed a facial approximation of what Saint Anthony of Padua may have looked like.
A facial approximation of Saint Anthony of Padua, the patron saint of lost and stolen articles.
A newly released image shows what Saint Anthony of Padua, a Portuguese priest who lived and died in the 13th century, may have looked like.
Using CT (computed tomography) scans of the priest’s skull, an international team of researchers created a lifelike facial approximation of St. Anthony, the patron saint of lost and stolen articles.
The final image includes a man with a cap of thinning brown hair crowning his head. The man wears a brown robe, just as Franciscan friars did in the Middle Ages.
However, this wouldn’t be the first time that a facial reconstruction was made of the religious figure. In 1981, Italian sculptor Roberto Cremesini created a replica of St. Anthony’s skull using plaster.
The piece was the result of an exhumation of the saint, which Pope John Paul II authorized, according to the new study, which will be published in the March 2023 issue of the journal Digital Applications in Archaeology and Cultural Heritage.
More than 30 years later, in 2014, researchers from the University of St. Anthony of Padua’s Anthropology Museum, along with a team of international forensic researchers, made another facial reconstruction using only a digital copy of the exhumed skull, according to a Catholic News Agency article.
That image features a man, his face angled to the viewer, also with a balding head of dark hair, dressed in a robe to make him appear more lifelike.
“Today’s work is an update on the technique and shows a clear evolution from the 2014 face,” Cícero Moraes, the study’s lead author and a Brazilian graphics expert who also worked on the 2014 reconstruction, told Live Science in an email.
“The present approximation has greatly improved anatomical coherence…and is more compatible with a real face.”
In addition to the facial approximation, Moraes and his co-authors, Luca Bezzi, an Italian archaeologist, and Nichola Carrara, with the University of St. Anthony of Padua, also made a reconstruction of the endocranium, the skull’s base, which was exceedingly large compared to the average human skull.
In other words, St. Anthony had a very large head. “The fact is that this volume is large even compared to modern individuals,” Moraes said.
St. Anthony died in 1231 in Padua at age 36; he was canonized a year later.
1,200-year-old Viking grave — with a shield and knives — found in a backyard in Norway
Archaeologist Marianne Bugge Kræmer with the view from the discovery site. Holmendammen can be seen in the background.
“This location has been a prominent hill, clearly visible in the terrain and with a great view,” says Marianne Bugge Kræmer to sciencenorway.no. She is an archaeologist at the Oslo Municipality Cultural Heritage Management Office.
Here, on the upper side of the small pond called Holmendammen, someone in the Viking Age chose to build a grave. Today it is a residential area in the west side of Oslo.
“The grave was located directly under a thin layer of topsoil and turf right on the east side of the highest point on the site, with a fantastic view west over today’s Holmendammen. This was a valley where the stream Holmenbekken flowed in ancient times,” Bugge Kræmer said to sciencenorway.no.
Was going to build a new detached house
Holmendammen was built at the beginning of the 20th century after the Holmenbekken was dammed, and the dam was used to make ice, according to lokalhistorewiki.no (link in Norwegian), a website with local history information.
Bugge Kræmer was in charge of the investigation of the Viking grave, which appeared as archaeologists were surveying the site. The investigation was triggered by plans to build new detached house on a plot by Holmendammen in the Vestre Aker district in Oslo.
Holmendammen in the 1920s. Holmenkollåsen, famous for its skiing facilities, can be seen in the background.
Brooch from the Viking Age
The remains of a richly appointed Viking grave appeared here. Cremated human remains were uncovered, as well as many other objects.
The archaeologists found fragments of a soapstone vessel. There was also a penannular brooch – also known as a celtic brooch, a sickle, two knives, horse tack such as a possible bridle and a bell, Bugge Kræmer said. The discovery was first reported by NRK Oslo and Viken.
A shield boss was also discovered in the grave. This is the metal in the centre of a wooden shield. Since the wood disintegrates over the course of centuries, it is often the round shield boss that remains.
The penannular brooch in particular dates the grave to the Viking Age.
“For now, the grave has been dated based on the artefacts it contains. This type of brooch with spheres begins to appear in approximately AD 850 and became common after the 10th century AD,” Kræmer said to sciencenorway.no.
Some of the objects that were dug out from the grave. The box at the bottom contains the remains of the cape brooch with spheres, which helps archaeologists assign a preliminary date to the find.
For the record, the Viking Age is defined as the period between around AD 800 to 1066.
This is a provisional dating, since the finds from the grave are in the Museum of Cultural History for conservation and further research.
But this buckle may say something about who was buried here.
Below you can see where Holmendammen is located in Oslo.
Gender and things
“This kind of cape brooch was used by men, and along with the discovery of a shield boss suggests that the deceased was a man,” Zanette Tsigaridas Glørstad said to sciencenorway.no.
Glørstad is an archaeologist and associate professor at the University of Oslo’s Museum of Cultural History. She is working with the Holmendammen find at the museum.
A great deal of information can be extracted from archaeological finds. Old DNA can be extracted from old bones and can, for example, reveal kinship, gender and other inherited characteristics. One striking example of this is a famous Viking grave in Birka in Sweden. For more than 150 years it was believed the person buried there was a male warrior, until researchers in 2017 did a genomic analysis which revealed that the remains in fact belonged to a woman.
But the remains from the grave at Holmendammen may not be able to be examined in this way.
An excavator was used to remove the top layer of soil, so that the soil beneath is revealed. The investigations were financed by the Norwegian Directorate for Cultural Heritage, since the project was a smaller, private initiative. The developer has not incurred any expenses, according to Marianne Bugge Kræmer.
“Right now the objects are in our conservation lab, and we are waiting for them to be ready before we can say anything more about the objects. We didn’t find any remains of unburnt bones, so we can’t extract DNA from what we found,” Glørstad said to sciencenorway.no.
It remains to be seen what information the researchers can uncover about the person who was buried here. A report on the discovery is now being prepared.
Oslo graves
Glørstad says this is the first artefact-rich Viking grave in Oslo that has been excavated by archaeologists. But many objects that can be linked to Viking graves have been found by, among others, construction workers in Oslo over the years.
Glørstad says that they are aware of the discovery of remains from around 60 graves from the Viking Age in Oslo. Most were found around the turn of the century in 1900 when the town expanded to St.Hanshaugen, Grünerløkka, Bjølsen, Tåsen and Sinsen.
These involve many individual items that can perhaps be connected to a grave, and in some cases they are found in a pile or together with burnt bones, says Glørstad.
For example, a Viking sword was found when Oslo’s new town hall was to be erected in the 1930s. This is just one of many discoveries that former county conservationist Frans-Arne Stylegar describes on this blog (in Norwegian), which Glørstad mentioned.
A rural necropolis from Late Antiquity discovered in northeastern France
Inrap archaeologists have unearthed a small rural necropolis from the late 5th century (Late Antiquity) at Sainte-Marie-aux-Chênes in northeastern France.
The necropolis, which is located along an ancient road, contains the remains of cremation structures as well as several richly furnished inhumations. The burial ground is most likely linked to the remains of an ancient Roman villa discovered nearby more than a decade ago.
In 2009, archaeological material was discovered during a survey of the site prior to the construction of a subdivision. Archaeologists discovered the remains of a 1st-century Roman villa’s pars Rustica (the farm buildings) and a Medieval hamlet occupied until the 12th century during the two seasons of excavations that followed.
Three Merovingian-era (mid-5th-8th centuries) tombs containing the remains of seven people, all from the same family, were found in the ruins of a Roman estate barn.
In 2020, when the subdivision planned to grow toward the former Ida mine and factory, excavations started up again. Test pits discovered the first early Iron Age remains at the site attesting that the area was settled earlier than previously realized and a continuation of the Medieval hamlet into the valley. In addition, a cremation pit dating to the 1st century and a secondary filling from the Gallo-Roman period were also unearthed.
In contrast to the 2009–10 digs, the 2020 excavation investigated the opposite side of the valley. Although the soil has been severely eroded, this has had the fortunate archaeological side-effect of accumulating sediment layers over the necropolis, aiding in the preservation of the remains.
About ten cremation structures were found by archaeologists after they dug through those layers. In meticulously carved quadrangular pits and much rougher round niches that appear to be postholes but aren’t, fragments of charred bone remains were discovered.
There aren’t any cinerary urns left, and not much bone remains. Some nails, possibly from a coffin, and a square pit with a collection of blacksmithing equipment and forge remnants were discovered (tongs, metal scraps, slag).
Glass plate.
In the same area, ten Late Antiquity tombs were discovered. The pits were carefully dug in parallel rows. There was a single inhumed individual in supine position, adults of both sexes, and four confirmed young children in each grave.
Hairpins and necklaces were used to identify two adult women. While no coffins or burial beds were discovered in the graves, iron nails and wood traces indicate that the bodies were buried in or on wooden biers.
The deceased were buried with a variety of grave goods. Ceramic vessels made of local Argonne clay were discovered at the bodies’ heads and/or feet.
They are believed to have contained food offerings now long decomposed. High-quality and diverse glassware was also buried with the dead: cups, bottles, flasks, goblets, bowls, and dishes. The deceased was adorned with jewelry, mostly copper alloy pieces with beads, amber, and glass paste.
There were coins in the graves as well, some individual, some in groups, most likely held in organic material purses. Last but not least, two bone combs and a miniature axe were discovered next to a child’s head.
The excavation’s recovered remains are still being studied. Researchers hope to learn more about the deceased’s sex, age, and health records. The necropolis itself is still being studied to learn more about how it was organized and used, as well as to shed light on the funerary practices of the people who lived and died there in Late Antiquity.
In France, a burial with six ankle bracelets was uncovered
An individual bedecked in copper jewelry was discovered during the excavation of a protohistoric necropolis in Aubagne, southeastern France.
The necropolis, which served as a transitional site between the late Bronze and early Iron ages from roughly 900 to 600 B.C., was first unearthed in 2021.
Ten burials, including three cremation deposits and eight burials buried beneath a tumulus, were discovered at that time. Three additional burials were found during this year’s excavation, one of which was hidden beneath a 33-foot-diameter tumulus.
The tumulus is noteworthy because a deep ditch surrounded it, and it probably used to be marked by a ring of stones. However, the burial inside was not furnished.
The two additional graves discovered this season were: The first contained the skeletal remains of a person who was wearing a twisted copper alloy bracelet and a pearl and stone jewel on the left shoulder. Near the deceased’s head, two ceramic pots were buried.
Six bracelets were discovered at ankle level, during excavation.
The second non-tumulus burial is the richest found in this necropolis thus far.
The individual was buried wearing a tubular torc with rolled terminals around their neck, three ankle bangles, and three toe rings. A brooch and a large ceramic urn were placed next to the deceased.
The tumulus and the first burial are close together. The third was separated from the first two. Each space was clearly and purposefully delimited by structures that are now long gone.
A line of postholes separates the tumulus and the first inhumation, indicating a linear structure that once formed the boundary line of space reserved for the dead. The second burial was defined by a six-foot-long alignment of stone blocks.
Torque.
The discovery of these three graves has significantly increased our knowledge of protohistoric southern French funerary customs.
They also show that the necropolis was much larger than what early archaeologists had thought it to be.
The necropolis is estimated to have covered at least 1.3 hectares and probably even more, according to the new data.
Early medieval female burial site is ‘most significant ever discovered’ in UK
Find dating from about 650AD in Northamptonshire includes jewelled necklace and changed archaeologists’ view of the period
A reconstruction of the burial site near Harpole in Northamptonshire.
Archaeologists don’t often bounce with excitement, but the Museum of London archaeology team could hardly contain themselves on Tuesday as they unveiled an “exhilarating” discovery made on the last day of an otherwise barren dig in the spring.
“This is the most significant early medieval female burial ever discovered in Britain,” said the leader of the dig, Levente Bence Balázs, almost skipping with elation. “It is an archaeologist’s dream to find something like this.”
“I was looking through a suspected rubbish pit when I saw teeth,” Balázs added, his voice catching with emotion at the memory. “Then two gold items appeared out of the earth and glinted at me.
These artefacts haven’t seen the light of day for 1,300 years, and to be the first person to see them is indescribable. But even then, we didn’t know quite how special this find was going to be.”
What Balázs had found was a woman buried between 630 and 670 AD – a woman buried in a bed alongside an extraordinary, 30-piece necklace of intricately-wrought gold, garnets and semi-precious stones. It is, by a country mile, the richest necklace of its type ever uncovered in Britain and reveals craftsmanship unparalleled in the early medieval period.
Collection of pendants from a necklace.
Also buried with the woman was a large, elaborately decorated cross, buried face down, another unique and mysterious feature of the grave’s secrets, and featuring highly unusual depictions of a human face in delicate silver with blue glass eyes. Two pots were buried alongside her, also unique in that they still contain a mysterious residue yet to be analysed.
“This is a find of international importance. This discovery has nudged the course of history, and the impact will get stronger as we investigate this find more deeply,” said Balázs.
“These mysterious discoveries pose so many more questions than they answer. There’s so much still to discover about what we’ve found and what it means.”
So much about the dig in April was inauspicious. The small, isolated Northamptonshire village of Harpole, whose name means “filthy pool”, was previously only known for its annual scarecrow festival and its proximity to arguably one of the worst motorway service stations in the UK.
There were no ancient churches near the dig or other burial sites. But thanks to the practice of developer-funded archeology, the Vistry Group housebuilders commissioned a search of the area they were building on.
Necklace reconstruction and layout side by side.
“I’ve worked for Vistry for 19 years and so I’ve had a lot of interaction with archaeologists,” said Daniel Oliver, Vistry’s regional technical director. “I’m used to Simon [Mortimer, archaeology consultant for the RPS group] ringing me up in great excitement about pot shards.” Beside him, Mortimer visibly stiffens in protest, and Oliver quickly adds: “Pot shards are very exciting, of course.”
“On the day the team discovered the Harpole treasure, I had five missed calls from Simon on my phone,” said Oliver. “I knew then that this was about more than pot shards. Exciting as pot shards are.”
The woman – and it is a woman, even though only the crowns of her teeth remain – was almost certainly an early Christian leader of significant personal wealth, both an abbess and a princess, perhaps. Lyn Blackmore, Museum of London archeology team specialist, said: “Women have been found buried alongside swords, but men have never been found buried alongside necklaces.” Experts agree she must have been one of the first women in Britain ever to reach a high position in the church.
Conservator Liz Barham working on the burial.
Devout as she clearly was, her grave is evidence of a shifting era when pagan and Christian beliefs were still in flux. “This is a fascinating burial of combined iconography: the burial bling has a distinctly pagan flavour, but the grave is also heavily vested in Christian iconography,” said Mortimer.
Vistry has waived its rights to the treasure, which now belongs to the state. The team hope it will be displayed locally, once their conservation work is complete – a painstaking endeavour that will take another two years at least.
Oliver is cagey about where the actual dig site is. It hasn’t been built over but, equally, it hasn’t been marked. “We don’t want people coming with metal detectors,” he said. “That would be a bit much.”
Attila The Hun May Have Raided The Roman Empire Because Of Drought
Attila the Hun played a massive role in the Roman Empire’s downfall.
Attila the Hun is one of history’s most notorious warlords – yet while he has traditionally been cast as a bloodthirsty barbarian motivated only by a lust for gold, new research suggests that his constant attacks on the Roman Empire may have been driven by drought.
After analyzing 2,000 years’ worth of tree-ring data, the study authors found that many of Attila’s most epic raids occurred during extremely dry years, and may therefore have represented an attempt to mitigate the effects of an unstable climate.
Though the origins of the Huns remain uncertain, they are believed to have crossed into Eastern Europe from Central Asia sometime around 370 CE, before settling on the Great Hungarian Plain to the east of the River Danube.
Following Attila’s rise to power in 434 CE, the Huns increasingly pillaged the eastern flank of the Roman Empire, and are largely credited with expediting the fall of Rome.
“Historical sources tell us that Roman and Hun diplomacy was extremely complex,” explained study author Dr Susanne Hakenbeck in a statement. “Initially it involved mutually beneficial arrangements, resulting in Hun elites gaining access to vast amounts of gold.
This system of collaboration broke down in the 440s, leading to regular raids of Roman lands and increasing demands for gold.”
However, the researchers say that this diplomatic breakdown alone may not explain Attila’s military incursions, and point out that the period coincided with a series of droughts.
Using stable carbon and oxygen isotope data from oak tree rings, the study authors reconstructed the Central European hydroclimate and found that the most devastating Hun raids of 447, 451, and 452 all occurred during extremely dry years.
“Tree ring data gives us an amazing opportunity to link climatic conditions to human activity on a year-by-year basis,” said study author Professor Ulf Büntgen. “We found that periods of drought recorded in biochemical signals in tree-rings coincided with an intensification of raiding activity in the region.”
Based on these findings, the researchers write that “the Huns’ apparently inexplicable violence may have been one strategy for coping with climatic extremes within a wider context of the social and economic changes that occurred at the time.”
This assumption is strengthened by previous isotopic analyses of fifth-century Hunnic skeletons, which revealed sudden changes in diet that may reflect the various strategies employed by the Huns in response to an uncertain climate.
The authors speculate that some of the group’s raids may have been launched to secure food and livestock, although they concede that more evidence is required to support this theory.
They also say that Attila’s demands that the Romans hand over an extensive strip of territory flanking the Danube might have been a mitigating strategy, as land in a floodplain would have provided greater food security in times of drought.
Furthermore, an unstable climate may have led to major social restructuring within Hun communities, as herders abandoned their flocks to become raiders.
The emergence of these war parties would then have led to a new network of allegiances between warlords, with Attila at the top of the hierarchy.
Such alliances would probably have been maintained with gold subsidies, which may explain Attila’s increasing demands for Roman gold.
“Climate-induced economic disruption may have required Attila and others of high rank to extract gold from the Roman provinces to keep war bands and maintain inter-elite loyalties,” explains Hakenbeck.
Fortunately for the Romans, Attila died suddenly in 453 after choking on his own blood following a nosebleed, and the Huns faded away shortly after. However, the damage they had already inflicted proved cataclysmic for the Roman Empire, highlighting the impact that climate can have on even the mightiest of civilizations.
