17th-Century Coin Unearthed at a Castle in Slovakia
A coin minted at the end of the 17th century is just one of the finds archaeologists have made during research work at the Sivý Kameň castle ruins in the Prievidza district.
The coin, which was among other items including ceramics and a knife found in the area around the former castle gates, dates back to when the castle served as a prison.
The castle, which was built in the 14th century, is now largely ruins, but using old photographs, experts identified where the castle gate and a forecourt once stood and began to unearth what was left of the structure belowground.
Archaeologist Dominika Andreánska told the TASR newswire: “Structures that are still preserved under the ground are important to us, but, of course, finds in castles inevitably include tiles from kilns, ceramic remnants, be they kitchen or painted tableware, small metal objects, nails, and we were also pleased with the first coin.”
According to Andreánska, the coin is a denarius dating back to the time of Leopold I. Habsburg with a minting date of 1679, and produced at the Kremnica mint.
“It is interesting in that it dates from the end of the 17th century, when Sivý Kameň castle functioned only as an occasional prison, or was a ruin, because it was burnt down during the anti-Habsburg uprisings,” she explained.
Research work at the castle is likely to continue for the next few years and once fieldwork has been completed it is expected that some of the finds will be exhibited at the Hornonitrianske Museum in Prievidza which is also involved in the dig.
Sivý Kameň was built around the middle of the 14th century for use in governing properties on the left bank of the Nitra River.
It was owned by the Majthényi family throughout the Middle Ages and into modern times but suffered a similar fate to many other castles in Slovakia as the Majthényis gradually moved to mansions in Nováky.
However, they always considered Sivý Kameň to be their ancestral seat and used it as an ancestral archive.
Rock Crystals Recovered from Neolithic Burial Mound in England
Distinctive and rare rock crystals were moved over long distances by Early Neolithic Brits and were used to mark their burial sites, according to groundbreaking new archaeological research.
Evidence for the use of rock crystal – a rare type of perfectly transparent quartz which forms in large hexagonal gems – has occasionally been found at prehistoric sites in the British Isles, but the little investigation has previously been done specifically into how the material was used and its potential significance.
A group of archaeologists from The University of Manchester worked with experts from the University of Cardiff and Herefordshire County Council on a dig at Dorstone Hill in Herefordshire, a mile south of another dig at Arthur’s Stone.
There, they studied a complex of 6000-year-old timber halls, burial mounds and enclosures from the Early Neolithic period, when farming and agriculture arrived in Britain for the first time.
As well as a range of artefacts including pottery, stone implements and cremated bones, they uncovered rock crystal which had been knapped like the flint at the site, but unlike the flint, it had not been turned into tools such as arrowheads or scrapers – instead, pieces were intentionally gathered and deposited within the burial mounds.
The experts say the material was deposited at the site over many generations, potentially for up to 300 years.
Only a few places in the British Isles have produced pure crystals large enough to produce the material at Dorstone Hill, the closest being Snowdonia in North Wales and St David’s Head in South West Wales – this means that the ancient Brits must have carried the material across large distances to reach the site.
As a result, the researchers speculate that the material may have been used by people to demonstrate their local identities and their connections with other places around the British Isles.
“It was highly exciting to find the crystal because it is exceptionally rare – in a time before the glass, these pieces of perfectly transparent solid material must have been really distinctive,” said lead researcher Nick Overton.
“I was very interested to discover where the material came from, and how people might have worked and used it.”
“The crystals would have looked very unusual in comparison to other stones they used, and are extremely distinctive as they emit light when hit or rubbed together and produce small patches of rainbow – we argue that their use would have created memorable moments that brought individuals together, forged local identities and connected the living with the dead whose remains they were deposited with.„
The researchers plan to study materials found at other sites to discover whether people were working with this material in similar ways, in order to uncover connections and local traditions.
They also intend to look at the chemical composition of the crystal to find out if they can track down its specific source.
Pathogens Detected in Bronze Age Remains in Greece
A team of researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, the British School at Athens and Temple University has found evidence of pathogens in the teeth of individuals from the Bronze Age that could explain why two ancient civilizations failed.
Location of archaeological sites with evidence of Y. pestis and S. enterica subsp. enterica from the LNBA (A) Map of Eurasia indicating relevant LNBA sites with genetic evidence of Y. pestis (circles) and S. enterica subsp. enterica (triangles). Hagios Charalambos in pink, previously published sites in black. (B) Map of Crete showing the location of Hagios Charalambos (pink) and important Bronze Age palatial sites (black).
In their paper published in the journal Current Biology, the group describes their genetic study of teeth found inside a cave called Hagios Charalambos on the island of Crete.
Prior research has shown that the Old Kingdom of Egypt and the Akkadian Empire, both Bronze Age civilizations, experienced sudden declines in population several thousand years ago.
It has been suggested that climate change and/or other unknown factors led to the decline, which also resulted in damage to infrastructure, reductions in trade and major cultural changes.
In this new effort, the researchers have found evidence suggesting that diseases could have been behind the decline.
The work involved studying the teeth from the remains of people dated back to approximately 2290 and 1909 BCE that had been brought to them from the dig site on Crete.
They found evidence of typical bacteria found in the modern human mouth—the kind that can lead to tooth decay. But more importantly, they also found evidence of Yersinia pestis—the bacteria behind the plague—and Salmonella enterica, which is the bacteria responsible for typhoid fever.
The findings suggest that an epidemic could have been responsible for the population decline in either or both of the Bronze Age civilizations.
The researchers note that there is one caveat—the strain of Yersinia pestis they found was not the same one that devastated so much of Europe centuries later; it has gone extinct, as has the Salmonella enterica strain they found.
Thus, it is not known how transmissible either were, or how deadly. Still, the evidence of such pathogens means that historians must factor in the possibility of disease as a reason for the fall of the two major civilizations.
They suggest further genetic studies be done on other ancient samples to determine how widespread such infections may have been.
Archaeologists in Seyðisfjörður have excavated jewellery that dates from 940 – 1100, just after the initial settlement of Iceland. Notably, one of the beads found in the excavation even bears the colours of the Icelandic national flag.
Remarkably well-preserved structures in Seyðisfjörður
Archaeological digs have been underway in Seyðisfjörður, a fishing village in the East Fjords of Iceland, since 2020. Due to the high slopes of the valley, Seyðisfjörður is subject to land slides, and local authorities plan to build defensive barriers to protect the village, which has suffered damage in recent years.
However, these same land slides have also preserved archaeological sites in the region particularly well.
The most recent discoveries are centred around the farmstead where Bjólfur, a settler named in Landnámabók, is believed to have had his farmstead. Significant finds at this site have included the remains of a man, a horse, a spear, and a boat.
Archaeologists have been able to date the site with a fair amount of accuracy, given tephra layers from eruptions, and landslide layers.
A unique bead
The artefact that has generated the most interest by far has been a bead which coincidentally has the colours of the Icelandic flag: blue, white, and red.
Ragnheiður Traustadóttir, an archaeologist and director of the team, has stated to RÚV that the find has caused quite the stir on social media, even causing some to claim a more recent provenance.
However, Ragnheiður has stated that it is certainly from the period 940 – 1100, given that it was found under known tephra and land slide layers.
“It will be interesting to put this in context with the four mounds we dug up last year,” she said to RÚV.
“There is a unique opportunity to look at the history of Seyðisfjörður from the second half of the tenth century until the eleventh century.”
Some twenty archaeologists are currently at work excavating in Seyðisfjörður. The field season is expected to last through the middle of August, and continue next year.
600-Year-Old Kitchen Discovered in the Czech Republic
Archaeologists made an unusual discovery while excavating the ruins of a medieval house in the town of Nový Jičín in the Moravian-Silesian region – a well-preserved kitchen that likely dates back to the early 15th century.
The medieval kitchen, containing a brick oven, hearth, ceramic dishes and even a wooden cooking spoon, was uncovered by archaeologists during the ongoing excavation of a wooden house from the Middle Ages in the town of Nový Jičín.
Uniquely preserved medieval kitchen unearthed north of Moravia
Pavel Stabrava from the local Novojičín Museum, says that the find was made as archaeologists were excavating the underground segments of a house that stands near the northern side of the historic centre’s town walls.
“This was a log house built on a stone foundation. Given the surrounding evidence, including the items that we found inside, we have been able to date it roughly to the period of the early 15th century.”
Based on its location, Mr Stabrava believes that the house would most likely have belonged to a burgher family, a social class equivalent to the medieval bourgeoisie.
“Since the house was located near the town walls, this would have been a less wealthy burgher family. The richest burghers would have lived in so-called ‘beer court’ houses around the town square.”
Most likely founded in the 1300s by the Lords of Kravaře, Nový (New) Jičín seems to have gradually evolved from an earlier settlement around the castle of Starý (Old) Jičín which protected the nearby Amber Road that ran from Poland.
František Kolář from the National Heritage Institute, which took part in the dig, says that the town would probably have been largely made up of wooden houses, but admits that not much is known about the medieval settlement.
Photo: Pavel Stabrava, Muzeum Novojičínska Photo: Pavel Stabrava, Muzeum Novojičínska
“This is because there haven’t been many archaeological excavations in the historical centre of the city. This is one of the first that has been made and we hope that we will be able to continue with excavations as the historic houses in the city get renovated.”
The medieval kitchenware inside the house was found in perfect condition, with the unbroken ceramic pots still containing their original lids. It seems that the items had just been washed and left to dry on the stone hearth.
Based on the evident burn marks found within the excavated house and on the surrounding historical sources, Mr Kolář believes that the items were found in this state because the inhabitants may have been forced to abandon the house in a rush.
“The working hypothesis is that the house was destroyed during the conquest of the city by the Hussites in 1427, when Hussite forces campaigned in Moravia and Silesia. Several independent historical sources mention the siege and conquest of the town, including the massacre of some of its citizens.”
The artefacts are now in the process of conservation, after which they will be stored in the depositories of the Novojičín Museum.
Pavel Stabrava hopes that further planned excavations around the exterior of the house will reveal more about the medieval town and its inhabitants.
7,000-Year-Old Forest and Footprints Uncovered in the Atlantis of Britain
7,000-Year-Old Forest and Footprints Uncovered in the Atlantis of Britain
Ancient footprints, as well as prehistoric tree stumps and logs, have become visible along a 200-meter stretch of a coastline at Low Hauxley near Amble, Northumberland, in what is believed to be Doggerland, the Atlantis of Britain.
The Daily Mail reports that the forest existed in the late Mesolithic period. It began to form around 5,300 BC, and it was covered by the ocean three centuries later.
The studies proved that at the time, when the ancient forest existed, the sea level was much lower. It was a period when Britain had recently separated from the land of what is currently Denmark.
The forest consisted mostly of hazel, alder, and oak trees. Researchers believe the forest was part of Doggerland, an ancient stretch of land, which connected the UK and Europe.
Doggerland: Stone Age Atlantis of Britain
Located in the North Sea, Doggerland is believed to have once measured approximately 100,000 square miles (258998 square kilometres). However, the end of the Ice Age saw a great rise in the sea level and an increase in storms and flooding in the region, causing Doggerland to gradually shrink.
Doggerland sometimes called the Stone Age Atlantis of Britain or the prehistoric Garden of Eden, is an area archaeologists have been waiting to rediscover. Finally, modern technology has reached a level in which their dreams may become a reality.
Doggerland is thought to have been first inhabited around 10,000 BC, and innovative technology is expected to aid a new study in glimpsing what life was like for the prehistoric humans living in the region before the catastrophic floods covered the territory sometime between 8000 – 6000 BC.
The area, which would have been home to a range of animals, as well as the hunter gatherers which stalked them, became flooded due to glacial melt, with some high-lying regions such as ‘Dogger Island’ (pictured right, highlighted red) serving as clues to the regions ancient past.
Sunken Land Reveals its Secrets
The latest research was made by a group of archaeologists and volunteers led by a team from Archaeological Research Services Ltd, which previously performed some other projects related to the Northumberland.
The works were possible due to the lower level of water. The major excavations involved a total of 700 people and uncovered part of an Iron Age site dating from around 300 BC near Druidge Bay.
Doctor Clive Waddington, of Archaeology Research Services, said:
”In 5,000 BC the sea level rose quickly and it drowned the land. The sand dunes were blown back further into the land, burying the forest, and then the sea receded a little. The sea level is now rising again, cutting back the sand dunes, and uncovering the forest.”
Clive Waddington, project director of Archaeological Research Services Ltd at the prehistoric archaeological dig at Low Hauxley near Amble, Northumberland
Ancient Footprints
Waddington maintains that his team also discovered evidence of humans living nearby. They found footprints of adults and children. Due to the results of the analysis of the footprints, it is believed that they wore leather shoes. Animal footprints of wild boar, brown bears and red deer also had been found.
Fossilized Forests
The remains of the forest of Doggerland do not belong to the oldest known forest. The oldest fossilized forest was discovered by a team from Binghamton University in the town of Gilboa in upstate New York.
The Gilboa area has been known as a tree fossil location since the late 19th century. However, the first researchers arrived there in the 1920s.
The most recent research started in 2004, when Linda VanAller Hernick, palaeontology collection manager, and Frank Mannolini, palaeontology collection technician, uncovered more intact specimens.
According to the article published in 2012 by William Stein, associate professor of biological sciences at Binghamton, the fossils discovered in this area are between 370 to 380 million years old.
See the 5,000-year-old forest unearthed by storms:
Holding hands for 5,000 years, a couple with mysterious jade rings and dagger
Bronze Age burial near Lake Baikal intrigues archaeologists who have not yet revealed the contents of the leather pouch between man’s kneecaps.
The man’s skeleton had a ring made of rare white jade over one eye socket.
Experts speculate that this ancient couple is an elderly man and his wife or concubine, buried for eternity in a show of affection. There are some unique aspects to the couple who are believed to be from the Bronze Age Glazkov culture.
The man’s skeleton had a ring made of rare white jade over one eye socket. Three more were on his chest. Archaeologist Dr Dmitry Kichigin said: ‘It was probably somehow connected with their ideas about the afterlife.’
Samples of the bone of the couple have been sent to Canada for radiocarbon analysis, but the Russian team involved in the excavations believe the couple to be 4,500 to 5,000 years old.
The site is a sacred burial place since Neolithic times overlooking the waters of Lake Baikal, the oldest and deepest lake in the world.
‘In the grave we found male and female skeletons, lying on their backs, heads to the west, hand in hand,’ he said. The site is a sacred burial place since Neolithic times overlooking the waters of Lake Baikal, the oldest and deepest lake in the world.
The male skeleton is complete but rodents destroyed the upper part of the female. Near the woman was a ‘massive’ knife made of jade, some 13 centimetres in length and 7 cm in width.
Pendants of red deer and musk deer teeth were found on the male skull, and around the feet. Most likely, they decorated the hat and footwear.
‘Were they relatives, or an owner and his concubine?’ asked the archaeologist. For now, the answer is unclear: he would like to conduct DNA tests to check if the pair were related, but this appears to be too expensive.
The burial unearthed this summer is located at a cape on Maloe More, the strait that separates the mainland and the Olkhon island, close to Chernorud settlement, some 260 kilometres north-east of Irkutsk.
The precise location is being kept secret, for now, to avoid amateur diggers wrecking a site which is likely to contain more burials, possibly older than this one.
‘We were lucky to find at least one skeleton in excellent condition, with implements and decorations – it is the dream of many archaeologists,’ said Kichigin. ‘It would be very interesting to find out the purposes the massive jade knife, which we found near the woman, was used for.
‘We also found some metal implement in a small leather bag between male’s kneecaps.’ The analysis will begin with the finds in the autumn.
‘The cape, where we conducted excavations, was obviously a sacred place for ancient people,’ he said. It was not a settlement but used for religious rites and as a graveyard from ancient times.
‘We can expect a lot of interesting discoveries on this archaeological site, so we plan to continue our work next year.’
The archaeological team led by Dr Kichigan is from Irkutsk National Research Technical University, with the assistance of Yuliana Yemelyanova, from the Laboratory of Archeology, Paleoecology, and Life Support Systems of the Peoples of North Asia.
The burial unearthed this summer is located at a cape on Maloe More, the strait that separates the mainland and the Olkhon island, close to Chernorud settlement.
Why ancient Romans used sketchy, lopsided dice to gamble and play board games
A tessera or a Roman six-sided die from the Vidy Roman Museum Rama
People have been rolling dice for a long, long time. The first dice were made from sheep knucklebones more than 5,000 years ago in ancient Sumer, and you won if it landed on the right one of the four flat sides. Around 3,000 years ago, somebody from modern-day Iraq and Iran sculpted bits of wood and ivory into the familiar six-sided dice, with different numbers of spots on each side from one to six.
People all over the world adopted this configuration long before Arabic numerals were invented. But few people of the ancient world loved to play dice as much as the Romans did.
The Romans called their 6-sided dice tesserae, and they often used them to move the pieces on a game board or for gambling, with the highest number providing the win. Since hard cash was on the line, one would expect these dice to be “fair”, or equally likely to land on any of their six sides.
However, most of them were actually lopsided, with some sides obviously much larger than others, making them more likely to land on them. These Roman-era dice were a total mess when it came to their shape, with no two sides shaped entirely alike.
Why would the Romans make their dice so asymmetrical? It’s not like the builders of great aqueducts and roads weren’t capable of carving a uniform cube, after all.
At first glance, it would seem like tesserae was made this way as a form of cheating, in order to increase the probability of showing a certain side. The vast majority of Roman dice were biased towards the numbers one and six. However, this doesn’t explain why virtually all Roman dice were designed this way. Did all the players cheat? The games would have collapsed if that were the case, and people would stop using them if cheating was done on purpose. This all suggests that the lumpy and lopsided design is a feature, not a bug.
The die has been cast — and that is the will of the gods
In a new study, archaeologist Jelmer Eerkens, a professor of anthropology at the University of California Davis, and Alex de Voogt, a professor at the department of economics and business of Drew University in New Jersey, present a different perspective: the asymmetrical features of the dice were related to the way the ancient Romans viewed the role of fate and the gods in the world.
Ancient Roman asymmetrical dice were found in the Netherlands.
In a previous study, the two researchers showed that over 90% of Roman dice found in the archaeological record are visibly asymmetrical, meaning one of their sides differs in size from the others by at least 5%. In their new work, the pair of scientists analyzed a sample of 28 dice from the Roman era excavated in the Netherlands. Unsurprisingly, 24 of the 28 objects made from clay, metal, and bone were visibly asymmetrical.
The larger the difference in size between the six sides of a dice, the greater the odds of rolling the number opposite the side with the largest surface area. In a perfect cube, there should be a 1 in 6 chance of rolling any number, but the odds of landing on the largest side of a Roman dice could be as high as 1 in 2.4. Surely, these kinds of visible biases couldn’t have been missed, especially by the hardcore gamblers playing for hours at end in Rome’s slums.
To get a better understanding of what the ancient Romans were thinking when they made their lopsided dice, Eerkens and de Voogt enlisted 23 psychology majors for an experiment.
Like today, Roman dice were numbered in the ‘sevens’ configuration, meaning the pips (little holes or divots) on opposite sides to each other add up to the number 7, so 1 is opposite to 6, 2 is opposite to 5, and 3 is opposite to 4.
The students were handed reproductions of Roman dice and were asked to place pips on the sides. Other than having to respect the sevens configuration, the participants were given no further instructions and were virtually oblivious to the purpose of the experiment.
Most of the students placed the one and six pips on the largest opposing surfaces of the lopsided dice — that’s exactly how the Romans chose to number their dice. Since both ancient Romans and modern students with no interest in gambling placed pips in locations that favour a one or six suggests both groups involuntarily chose this configuration, rather than making a conscious effort to cheat and stack the odds in their favour.
When asked about what prompted them to place the pips the way they had, the students said it felt natural to place one and six on the largest sides, especially since six requires the most pips to place.
This experiment suggests that the Romans didn’t actually care that much for ‘fair’ odds, perhaps because they did not grasp the concept of probability. Instead, the ancient Romans put all their fate in the gods like Fortuna, the personification of luck. Since gods and fate played such a central role in the lives of these people, any side that rolled on the dice was the ‘right’ side — the one chosen by the gods. Of course, some experienced gamblers may have noticed the bias and used it to their advantage, but the unfair odds were likely not common knowledge at the time.
“Knowing that it makes sense that Romans probably did not think that die shape mattered because even with a non-cubic die all sides can still be thrown,” Eerkens told Haaretz. “Today we would say that, yes, each side can be thrown but with unequal probabilities – however, most people in Roman times probably would not understand that way of thinking.”
Such thinking may have persisted until well into the Middle Ages. It wasn’t until the Renaissance period that we start seeing perfectly fair cube-shaped dice, and it is perhaps no coincidence that around this time great thinkers like Galileo Galilei or Blaise Pascal were publishing papers about chance and probability, in some cases, they were actually consulting with local gamblers. These new ideas about fairness, chance, and mathematical probability may have spread among the ‘gamers’ of the time and finally led to fairer dice.
