Category Archives: WORLD

Who Was the Exceptionally Powerfully Built Viking Buried in the Gokstad Ship?

Who Was the Exceptionally Powerfully Built Viking Buried in the Gokstad Ship?

Ever since the publication of a scientific article in 1883, “everyone” has known that the skeleton found in the magnificent Gokstad ship in Eastern Norway belonged to Olaf Geirstad-Alf, the legendary Viking king of the House of Yngling. In recent years, however, research has shown that this must be wrong.

The clinker-built Gokstad ship dating back to the year 890 AD is currently on display at the Viking Ship Museum in Oslo, Norway.

Dendrochronological datings show that the Gokstad ship was built about the year 890 AD, i.e. the height of Norwegian expansion in the British Isles, and in the year 901, it was buried in the so-called “King’s Mound” (Gokstad Mound) in Vestfold, Eastern Norway.

The vessel largely is constructed of oak and is 23.22 meters (76.18 ft) long and 5.18 meters (17 ft) wide. On each side, there are sixteen oar holes, and the ship was built to carry thirty-two oarsmen. With a steersman (the ship’s owner) and lookout, the crew consisted of thirty-four people but could carry a maximum of seventy men with some equipment.

The Gokstad ship was both flexible and fast with a top speed of more than 12 knots (14 mph) propelled by the sail of about 110 square meters (1,200 square feet). Recent tests have shown that the vessel worked very well with both sail and oars, and it may have been used for trade, Viking raids and explorations. There have not been found any thwarts, and the oarsmen probably have been sitting on chests that also contained their personal equipment.

Model of the Gokstad Viking ship.

Grave Findings

When the Gokstad ship was excavated, sixty-four shields were discovered (thirty-two on each side) and every second was painted in yellow and black. In the front part of the ship, there were discovered fragments of white wool fabric with sewn red stripes that probably were parts of the sail. Behind the mast, a burial chamber was discovered with the remains of a beautifully woven carpet decorating the walls. Inside the burial chamber, there was found a made bed containing the buried person.

In addition to the Gokstad ship itself, there were among other objects found a gaming board with gaming pieces made of horn, fish hooks, harness fittings of iron, lead and gilded bronze, kitchenware, and six beds, one tent, one sled and three smaller boats. There were also discovered a large number of animal bones that had belonged to twelve horses, eight dogs, two northern goshawks and two peacocks.

Animals in the Gokstad ship grave.

When the excavation took place in 1880, it soon became clear that parts of the grave goods had been plundered in ancient times: there were no jewellery or any precious metals in the grave, nor any weapons that in the Viking Age were an important part of a warrior’s grave goods preparing him for his journey to the Afterlife. Just south of the Gokstad burial mound, a major trading centre has recently been discovered. The items excavated tell different stories and document the close connection between Vestfold and the rest of the world at the time. Weights found in the trading centre show that hectic trading activities took place at about the same time as the Gokstad ship burial.

Human Bones

In 2007, bones from a human skeleton found in the grave were thoroughly examined by Professor Per Holck at the Institute of Basic Medical Sciences, University of Oslo.

The examination proved that the bones had belonged to a man who died in his 40s. He was between 178 (5ft 10 in) and 184 centimetres tall (6ft), something that was significantly taller than the average height of the period (165 cm / 5ft 5in) and the Viking was exceptionally powerfully built. The man in the Gokstad ship grave has mainly eaten terrestrial food [food coming from land and not the sea, like meat and corn] showing that he has belonged to the Norse community’s social elite.

Professor Holck found clear marks of five or six different cuts from an axe, knife and sword: one on each of the thigh bones, two or three on the left and one on the right calf bone. It is likely that the Gokstad man did not survive these injuries, something proved by the fact that there are no signs that his wounds have healed.

Cut on the leg (tuberositas tibiae), probably from a sword.

Although none of the injuries has been fatal (perhaps with the exception of a cut on the inside of the right thigh bone, which may have damaged the femoral artery), it cannot be excluded that this particular Viking has had other cuts that did kill him, for example in the head (only parts of the skull was discovered).

Aiming for the enemy’s legs was a common fighting technique in the Middle Ages. The legs were not covered by chain mails and were vulnerable, a fact documented from many examples in Norse sagas.

Professor Holck concluded that there must have been at least two people, with three different weapons, who have killed the Gokstad man, and that the cuts indicate that he most likely was wearing armour and killed in battle.

Not King Olaf Geirstad-Alf

The theory is that the skeleton from the Gokstad mound has belonged to Olaf Geirstad-Alf (Old Norse: Ólaf Geirstaða Álfr, the elf of Geirstad) was already described in a scientific article by anatomy professor Jacob Heiberg back in 1883, and the man’s identity has since been widely accepted. In the first section of the Heimskringla King’s Sagas written down in 1225 by Snorri Sturloson, Olaf  «Geirstad-Alf» Gudrødsson is mentioned with a couple of lines: Olaf was a petty king in Vestfold, and the half brother of Halfdan the Black (c. 810 – c. 869 AD). Olaf was allegedly Halfdan’s nineteen years older brother, and thus probably born around the year 800. Since the ship’s grave can be dated back to the year 901, about half a century after Olaf Geirstad-Alf’s death, researchers can safely say that this is not Olaf’s grave.

The Gokstad burial mound in Vestfold, Eastern Norway.

However, who was the exceptionally powerfully built Viking found in the Oseberg grave chamber?

If we take a close look at the large and versatile Oseberg ship and the rich discoveries, and how the person in the grave was killed – it is quite certain that this was a powerful and respected Viking warrior from Vestfold. The peacocks discovered show that this was a man with an international network and that he did belong to the Norse upper class. Perhaps the birds were a gift from an English king or trophies he brought back home from a Viking raid in Spain?

In Medieval Europe peacocks, a bird species originally brought back from Asia, were considered a symbol of power among kings and aristocrats. Maybe the Gokstad man was a powerful Viking petty king, earl or chieftain who had accumulated enormous wealth abroad?

However, he may also have been an elite warrior, a berserker, one of the king’s loyal elite soldiers who received the funeral he deserved when he was killed in battle. If he was killed in Dublin, London, York– or in Novgorod (Russia), and was brought home to be buried, we do not know. Either way – it is certain that the human bones buried in the Gokstad ship did not belong to King Olaf Geirstad-Alf.

East Bay’s mysterious rock walls: Paranormal? American Stonehenge? Theories abound

East Bay’s mysterious rock walls: Paranormal? American Stonehenge? Theories abound

If walls could speak, what a tale these mysterious huge boulders would tell. Perched high atop the lonely, windswept ridges of the Diablo Range, chains of stacked stones stand sentry above East Bay cities — yet they delineate nothing.

Long the subject of intrigue — Who built them? Why? How? — the walls are now being mapped by a San Francisco State archaeologist who believes they hold important clues to early California history and deserve our attention and protection.

“They are historic sites,” said Jeffrey Fentress, who is measuring and mapping them for the East Bay Regional Park District, then submitting his findings to the California Office of Historic Preservation. “By recording the walls, they become a permanent part of the state archive and are protected — as well as they can be — from future development.”

There are no written or photographic records of their construction in a landscape that has been inhabited by humans for at least 7,000 years. So, like the fabled crop circles of England, the walls have inspired theories ranging from the paranormal to the historically bizarre.

“There is no definitive answer on its origins, which further delights the public, who can take it to new levels of speculation,” said Mark Hylkema, archaeologist for the Santa Cruz District of California State Parks.

New Age mystics have declared that their builders were creatures from a vanished Pacific island; amateur historians suggest that they were Mongols or West Africans. Some theorize that the walls offered defence from intruders; others believe they played a peaceful and spiritual or astronomical role, perhaps serving as a “solstice site” like Stonehenge.

Sections of walls are scattered atop Santa Clara County’s Ed Levin County Park, the Russian Ridge in the Santa Cruz Mountains, several parks within the East Bay Regional Park District and a few private ranches in the Livermore Valley. Some also can be seen in the Sierra foothills, along state Highway 50 past El Dorado Hills.

A pile of rocks form a segment of “Mystery Walls” at Ed Levin County Park in Santa Clara County on Oct. 10, 2015.
A pile of rocks form a segment of “Mystery Walls” at Ed Levin County Park in Santa Clara County on Oct. 10, 2015.

While well known to the region’s hikers, park officials are reluctant to disclose precise locations because they fear they will attract vandals. A large stone circle on Pleasanton Ridge was destroyed by real estate development in the 1990s.

Standing 3- to 4-feet high and wide, they’re sturdy yet unsecured by mortar. They seem too low to offer much protection, or confine horses. Some rocks are melon-size. The larger ones weigh up to a ton. Lifting them no doubt required the effort of several men.

“Some go in a straight line, others twist like a demented snake up a steep hillside, others come in a spiral two hundred feet wide and circle into a boulder,” amateur wall historian Russell Swanson wrote in 1997. Over 12 years, he visited more than 40 miles of the stone structures. The walls seem out of place in California’s wild golden hills, evoking instead memories of tidy New England fields memorialized by poet Robert Frost, or the rich green pastures of Ireland.

One of many old stone walls found around the southern and eastern San Francisco Bay in California.

Why, in such a vast landscape, didn’t builders simply use barbed wire? Or wood? Instead, they’re built of coarse-grained sandstone, abundant in these hills, called graywacke.

Native Americans say they historically had little interest in erecting boundaries. “In general, our ancestors did not believe in scarring or altering Mother Earth,” said Valentin Lopez, chairman of the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band. In 1904, John Fryer, a UC Berkeley professor of Oriental languages and literature, asserted that they were “undoubtedly the work of Mongolians. … The Chinese would naturally wall themselves in.”

Several years later, ethnologist Henry C. Meyers agreed they were the product of strong and ancient civilizations: “Neither man nor men of the present day could possibly put large stones of these walls in place without appliances of some kind.”

Dr. Robert F. Fisher, the founder of the Mission Peak Heritage Foundation, told the Santa Cruz Sentinel in 1984 that he was mystified: “They predate the Indians. They predate the Spaniards. It doesn’t fit in with any of the later histories.”

More recently, lichen analyses date the walls back to the 1850s to 1880s — the post-Gold Rush era, when California was swelling with newcomers anxious to lay their claim on acreage. While imperfect, the technique dates inanimate objects by measuring the diameter of growing lichens.

That evidence hasn’t stopped the internet from spawning its own theories, crediting mythical Lemurians — tall people who breathed through scaly aqua skin and sought refuge in California after the disappearance of the Pacific continent of Mu. Much more likely is an explanation put forth by a consensus of experts like Fentress; State Parks archaeologist Hylkema; and Beverly Ortiz, cultural services coordinator of the East Bay Regional Park District.

The walls were likely built to contain cattle by new European immigrants in the post-Gold Rush era, perhaps using unpaid or low-paid Native American, Chinese or Mexican labour, they believe. The stones stand as a legacy of our once-rural culture, poignant reminders of people long gone. Unlike the railroad or mining tycoons — the Crockers, Stanfords, Huntingtons and Floods — these early ranchers left no mansions, antiques or jewellery. Only rocks.

“The rock walls throughout the East Bay are neither ancient nor mysterious, even if the specific individuals who made them are unknown to us today,” Ortiz said. “They are associated with historic Euro-American ranching, dairy and dry farming activities.”

The historians note that cattle and sheep don’t need tall walls to be managed; they’re docile and don’t jump. The rocks, Fentress and Ortiz said, also could have been used to help catch or drain water or establish boundaries between ranches.

But which ethnic group built the walls?

The Portuguese were among the early ranchers, said Robert Burrill and Joseph Ehardt, of the Milpitas Historical Society. But other immigrants, such as Italians, Irish and Spaniards, may have brought wall-building skills from their homelands.

These post-Gold Rush settlers, who were not wealthy, likely built walls with their own hands, Fentress said. But they also may have enlisted low-cost labour from other ethnic groups, such as Mexicans — who had been displaced from their ranchos — and Chinese, who build the railroads and projects like Oakland’s Lake Chabot dam. Or perhaps they were built by Native Americans during an era that authorized the forced apprenticeship of native peoples, a practice not banned until the 1860s.

Archaeologists say the walls are a ghostly elegy of their builders.

“They are essentially the archaeology of the working class, the common people who came here and made a living,” Fentress said. “It is the only evidence we have of these people’s lives — and it is important to tell that story as well as we can.”

Meet The Inca Ice Maiden, Perhaps The Best-Preserved Mummy In Human History

Meet The Inca Ice Maiden, Perhaps The Best-Preserved Mummy In Human History

The must-see attraction for visitors to Museo Santuarios Andinos (Museum of Andean Sanctuaries) in Arequipa, Peru is without a doubt the Mummy Juanita, one of the world’s best-preserved corpses.

Her full head of dark hair is still intact and the skin on her hands and arms, discolouration aside, shows almost no decay. The mummy’s discoverer, Johan Reinhard, even made note of just how perfectly the mummy’s skin had been preserved, “down to visible hairs.”

As peaceful as she looks — a far cry from some of the more ghastly mummies that researchers have discovered — Juanita’s life was a short one that ended with her being sacrificed to the Inca gods.

Meet The Inca Ice Maiden, Perhaps The Best-Preserved Mummy In Human History
Mummy Juanita is on display at the Museum of the Nation in Lima, Peru. March 1999.

Scientists estimate that Juanita was between 12 and 15 years old when she died as part of capacocha, a sacrificial rite among the Inca that involved the deaths of children.

Translated as “royal obligation,” capacocha was the Inca’s attempt at ensuring that the best and healthiest among them were sacrificed to appease the gods, often as a way to stop a natural disaster or ensure a healthy harvest. Considering that Juanita’s body was discovered atop Ampato, a volcano in the Andes, her sacrifice very likely played into the Inca’s mountain worship.

Preparation For Death

Juanita’s life prior to her selection for human sacrifice probably wasn’t all that unusual. Her days leading up to her death, however, were very different from the lifestyle of a typical Inca girl. Scientists were able to use DNA from Juanita’s well-preserved hair to create a timeline of those days and deduce what her diet was like before capacocha.

Markers in her hair indicate that she was selected for sacrifice about a year before her actual death and switched from a standard Inca diet of potatoes and vegetables to the more elite foods of animal protein and maze, along with large quantities of coca and alcohol.

As Andrew Wilson, a forensic and archaeological expert, explained to National Geographic, the final six to eight weeks of life of Inca child sacrifices were one of a very intoxicated psychological state altered by the chemical reaction of coca and chicha alcohol.

Thus archaeologists believe that upon Juanita’s death, she was likely in a very docile and relaxed state. While the Incas would eventually perfect this drug mixture — which, coupled with the mountainous high altitudes, would cause the child sacrifices to fall into a permanent sleep — Juanita wasn’t so lucky.

Momia Juanita

Radiologist Elliot Fishman would discover that Juanita’s death was brought about by a massive haemorrhage from a club blow to the head. Fishman concluded that her injuries were “typical of someone who has been hit by a baseball bat.” After the death blow, her skull swelled with blood, pushing her brain to the side. Had blunt trauma to the head not occurred, her brain would have dried symmetrically in the centre of her skull.

Juanita’s Discovery

After her death, sometime between 1450 and 1480, Juanita would sit alone in the mountains until she was uncovered in September 1995 by anthropologist Johan Reinhard and his Peruvian climbing partner, Miguel Zárate.

If it weren’t for volcanic activity, it’s possible that the mummified young girl would have continued to sit on the frozen mountain top for centuries to come. But because of the volcanic activity warming the snow though, Mt. Ampato’s snowcap began to melt, pushing the wrapped mummy and her burial site down the mountain.

Reinhard and Zárate discovered the small bundled mummy inside a crater on the mountain, along with numerous burial items including pottery, shells, and small figurines.

The thin, cold air 20,000-feet up near the summit of Mt. Ampato had left the mummy incredibly intact. “The doctors have been shaking their heads and saying [the mummies] sure don’t look 500 years old [but] could have died a few weeks ago,” Reinhard recalled in a 1999 interview.

The discovery of such a well-preserved mummy instantly created a surge of interest throughout the scientific community. Reinhard would return to the mountain top a month later with a full team and find two more mummified children, this time a boy and a girl.

Reports from a Spanish soldier who witnessed sacrifices of children in pairs suggest that the boy and girl might have been buried as “companion sacrifices” for Mummy Juanita.

All in all, experts estimate that there may be hundreds of Inca children mummified in the mountain peaks of the Andes still waiting to be discovered.

Treasure of 1,290 Ancient Roman Coins Discovered by Amateur Archaeologist in Switzerland

Treasure of 1,290 Ancient Roman Coins Discovered by Amateur Archaeologist in Switzerland

An amateur archaeologist has found a big treasure trove of over 1,290 priceless, ancient Roman coins dating back to the 4th Century AD near Bubendorf, a municipality in the district of Liestal, in the canton of Basle-County, in Switzerland.

Treasure of 1,290 Ancient Roman Coins Discovered by Amateur Archaeologist in Switzerland

The hoard was discovered by volunteer archaeological scout Daniel Lüdin in a forested area near Wildenstein Castle in September 2021.

The finder, Daniel Lüdin, was searching a forest with a metal detector near Bubendorf, a municipality in the district of Liestal, in the canton of Basle-County, in Switzerland, when he made the discovery.

When his metal detector signalled a strong alert, Lüdin dug down a little and found a few Roman coins and some potsherds, not enough to explain the strength of the signal. He dug down a little more and hit the jackpot.

The coins which were made during the reign of Constantine the Great (AD 306-337) show portraits of the emperor and his relatives in the front.

Daniel Lüdin was very careful. He reconsidered the find, filled in the hole, and informed Archeologie Baselland.

Thanks to this professional approach, they removed the pot in a soil block so that all of the coins, pot fragments, and any invisible archaeological treasures like traces of organic remains could be excavated under laboratory conditions.

The block removal also allowed researchers to CT scan the soil block to map out the contents.

They revealed that the coins in the pot had been separated in two by a piece of cowhide at the time of their burial, although it is currently unclear why and what purpose this served.

Andreas Fischer, of Archaeologie Baselland said: “One can only speculate about the meaning and purpose of this separation.”

What is clear, however, is that these coins are made of a copper alloy and of silver, and they were all “minted during the reign of Emperor Constantine the Great (306-337 AD). The youngest specimens date from the years 332-335 AD.”

A black space seen in the CT scans between two layers of coins turned out to be a simple piece of leather.

The total value of 1290 coppers was the equivalent of a gold solidus or about two months’ salary for a soldier in the legions.

The expert said that often, there are simple explanations as to why people would bury their valuables, but none of them appears to apply here.

What makes the hoard so unusual is that it was buried during a time of political and economic stability. Coin hoards from the 4th century were typically buried during periods of unrest, but Constantine’s reign was not among them. Hoards from this period are vanishingly rare throughout the Empire.

3D model of the hoard after the external soil was cleaned but before the contents were excavated in the laboratory. Jan von Wartburg.

It seems likely that this one was buried for other reasons. One possibility is a religious offering as the find site was on the border between three known Roman estates, so it could have been a boundary line sacrifice.

The Earliest Form of Life From 4.28 Billion Years Ago Discovered

The Earliest Form of Life From 4.28 Billion Years Ago Discovered

Every time we keep on looking back in history to find the earliest traces of life we keep on finding earlier evidence of when life began on this Earth. There is a precise correlation between the prehistoric age and the size of evidence.

The Earliest Form of Life From 4.28 Billion Years Ago Discovered
The oldest rocks on our planet have a source of life at a microscopic level.

A new study has discovered evidence that life on Earth has started somewhere between 3.75 and 4.28 billion years ago. 

A team of researchers from the University College London has gone on a hunt to find microbial life on the oldest rocks that are present on our planet. The research team analyzed a fist-sized rock from Quebec, Canada, estimated to be between 3.75 and 4.28 billion years old.

The rock had been collected from The Nuvvuagittuq Greenstone Belt in Quebec, known to house the oldest rocks on Earth

Looking at the rocks on a microscope showed “tree-like” stems with parallel branches as if the rocks have some sort of biological origin. Such a microbiological structure could have not been created through a chemical reaction but through the impact of a biological entity such as ancient bacteria. 

In order to get such an accurate view at a micro level, the researchers had to slice the rock into sections as thick as a piece of paper or 100 microns in order to properly view the structure at a micro-level.

The findings within the rock structure were compared to other old fossils and minerals examined previously. Other ancient rock specimens examined had a similar structure at a microscopic level, making the theory more plausible. 

Researchers also discovered debris on a micro-level that showed the different ways the microbes fed and sustained themselves in the beginning.

There were signs of mineralized chemical by-products in the rocks that are similar to ancient microbes living off the iron, sulfur, and carbon dioxide through a complex system of photosynthesis without oxygen

This makes scientists think that life on Earth existed as early as 300 million years after Earth had been created. This microbial life was the first form of life that through the reinforcement of chemical reactions kept mutating and evolving to greater forms. 

Dr. Dominic Papineau, lead author of the research from UCL is supporting the findings: 

“Using many different lines of evidence, our study strongly suggests a number of different types of bacteria existed on Earth between 3.75 and 4.28 billion years ago. This means life could have begun as little as 300 million years after Earth formed. In geological terms, this is quick — about one spin of the Sun around the galaxy.” (Quote by Dr. Dominic Papineau)

Prior to this study, another old rock discovered in Western Australia which dated 3.46 billion years old had been examined, but the scientists from that study came to the conclusion that it was just a fossil with no biological origins.

The technology and techniques that have been involved in this recent study are states of the art, but more samples from diverse parts of the world would be required to give a more plausible conclusion. 

The ancient computer may have had its clock set to 23 December 178 BC

The ancient computer may have had its clock set to 23 December 178 BC

In 1901, divers looking to research different species of fish next to the tiny island of Antikythera in Grece discovered an old shipwreck from ancient times which contained vast treasures.

The ancient computer may have had its clock set to 23 December 178 BC
CT scan of Antikythera mechanismHoroscopic Astrology

Besides all the treasure, a piece of corroded metal was found which had a very odd shape. Those who discovered it in 1901 didn’t have the knowledge nor the technology to understand what exactly they were looking at.

It was only after 120 years that scientists understood what they were looking for after splitting the object apart.

A CT scan performed on the artefact in 2005 revealed that there were many small bronze gears inside that when turned, would give some sort of value.

The vast knowledge of astrology that is discovered in the writings of ancient Greek historians is crazy and this is something that scientists took into consideration when looking at this mechanism. 

Many years ago a replica was created by Michael Wright who took detailed X-rays of the discovered computer whilst working as a curator of mechanical engineering at the Science Museum in London.

The replica helped us understand that the computer discovered in 1901 was missing a lot of parts as only 82 fragments have survived, that is a third of all the pieces necessary for the mechanism to work. 

Experts say that it had been created to calculate the theories of ancient astrologists. The idea of having a machine able to calculate and validate scientific theories in ancient times is absolutely mind-blowing. Most of the information known about this ancient computer was discovered in 2021 and now even more incredible things are being unveiled. 

Aristeidis Voulgaris of the Thessaloniki Directorate of Culture and Tourism in Greece now supposes the calibration date was around 23 December 178 BC.

Experts call this “Day Zero” or the day that the computer was first used. This reinforces beliefs of the ancient computer being built sometime around 200BC. That date is interesting as Voulgaris mentions a lot of important events that occurred in Greece during 178BC. 

This artefact let alone proves how vastly superior ancient Greeks were. Their technical abilities were far beyond what we initially thought. Other researchers have made their own independent calculations based on the data shown.

The calculations look at how accurate the computer’s astronomical predictions are. The ingeniosity behind the mechanism still leaves everyone baffled. 

There are still many unknown things about this ancient computer, such as the inscriptions on the original part discovered in 1901 which makes experts scratch their heads. It is possible that the computer was used for something else from what the experts are currently predicting, although they can’t see to discover any new functions or mechanisms. 

Historians have also been checking the archives to find some information about this ancient computer. There are many predictions and speculations made along the way, but no concrete information had been found.

Researchers such as Freeth Tony and Jones Alexander who have spent many years analyzing the artefact are trying to decrypt the inscriptions mean, as these may be further instruction on how to properly utilize the ancient computer. 

6000-Year-Old Salt Production House Rewrites Europe’s History

6000-Year-Old Salt Production House Rewrites Europe’s History

Archaeologists in the UK have found an ancient stone age-era salt-production house in North Yorkshire, estimated to be older even than Stonehenge, UK media outlets reported on Wednesday.

6000-Year-Old Salt Production House Rewrites Europe’s History

Dating from the Neolithic period around 3800 B.C.E. the 6,000-year-old find is the latest discovery from the Street House Farm site in Loftus.

Finds unearthed on a shoreline near Loftus include three hearths, fragments of broken Neolithic pottery, a ditch, some still containing salt deposits, shaped stone artefacts, and a storage pit. All of the finds are cited as important evidence of salt processing.

According to Steve Sherlock, the archaeologist who led the dig, the finds are “spectacular and of national significance”.

The discovery is particularly important in that it can substantially rewrite the historical understanding of Neolithic England because the facility is not only the oldest facility found on the island but also one of the oldest facilities found in Western Europe.

This new finding, he explained, according to The Independent, indicates that properly settled civilizations developed on the island earlier than expected, with stone-age Britons transitioning into an agricultural society from a hunter-gather lifestyle. In fact, it pushes salt-making back by nearly 2,400 years.

Fragments of tools for salt processing found at the neolithic site in North Yorkshire

Salt was an extremely valuable commodity, and the extraction process is very complex and implies a certain level of sophistication.

In fact, according to UK sea-salt production expert David Lea-Wilson, “Any ancient coastal culture that was able to master that technology would have been able to expand their economy substantially,” according to The Independent.

Salt was essential to the expansion of the Stone Age. This is because it gave the people of the Neolithic Age the ability to preserve meat.

According to the Independent, James Swift, a traditional meat preservation expert, said that effective management of cattle is almost impossible without salt.

In other words, the fact that salt can be used at all means that the entire early agricultural sector will undergo revolutionary changes. Male calves can be preserved after slaughter throughout the year, and cows have more grass, which in turn means more milk production.

And not only was this salt production house effective but according to Sherlock, salt-making experts said “you’d expect to find that in the Iron Age,” according to the New Scientist news site.

Through some archaeological detective work, Sherlock not only figured out how the salt-making facilities work but also first figured out how the process reached Britain. The pottery used to extract salt from seawater is a special type of bowl that can be traced back to France.

According to The Guardian, there is a theory that migrants from the north of France brought ceramics, and thus even technology, to Britain around 4000 BC.

Stunning Roman-looking sandals found deep in the snow in the Norwegian mountains

Stunning Roman-looking sandals found deep in the snow in the Norwegian mountains

Global warming is leading to the retreat of mountain glaciers. Incredibly well preserved and rare artefacts have emerged from melting glaciers and ice patches in North America, the Alps, and Scandinavia.

Stunning Roman-looking sandals found deep in the snow in the Norwegian mountains

Team Secrets of the Ice has been searching for clues about the past in the Norwegian mountains for 15 years, and during this time the scientists have made many unusual discoveries.

One of the most interesting finds the team found is the surprising Roman-looking sandal they found buried deep in the snow in a dangerous Norwegian mountain pass.

The Lendbreen ice patch suffered an incredible melt in the fall of 2019. Finds appeared on the surface of the ice, showing that the melt had reached ice layers not previously touched by melt.

The Lendbreen ice patch in Norway’s Jotunheim Mountains, about 200 miles northwest of Oslo is located high in the mountains of southern Norway.  In the 1800s, the area was dubbed the Jotunheim Mountains, or the home of the Jötnar, the fearful giants in Norse mythology.

The Horse Ice Patch.

Lendbreen has provided the most archaeological finds of any ice patch in Scandinavia and possibly the world.

Among the most significant finds are the hundreds of pre-historic cairns, which are stone structures that signalled to the travellers where the route went, a lost Viking settlement, an iron horseshoe, as well as a 1700-year-old tunic.

Espen Finstad and his team have visited the area on several occasions and their latest finds were recently summarized in a new report.

Did Ancient Romans Visit The Norwegian Mountains?

Would there always have been snow here? Most likely, Finstad says. The amounts would have varied, but in summer or winter, this was no place for flimsy shoes.

A reconstruction of the shoe was made by conservator Vegard Vike at the Museum of Cultural History in Oslo.

“I do a lot of hiking in the mountains, and you know, I find myself thinking, why would you wear that shoe up here… it’s just very, open. Full of patterns and holes. But it was there. We found it on the ice”, says Finstad.

“He suggests googling roman shoes for images of similar footwear. The shoe found in the Norwegian mountains is dated to 200-500, so the end of the Roman Empire,” Science in Norway reports.

“It looks almost like a sandal. It’s pretty astonishing, we’re up here at almost 2,000 meters, and we find a shoe with fashion elements, similar to those found on the continent at the time,” Finstad says.

Remains of textiles were found at the Horse Ice Patch. Perhaps something like this was worn inside the shoe?

“We have found quite a number of shoes in the ice, from the Early Bronze Age to the Medieval period,” glacial archaeologist Lars Pilø tweeted about the Horse Ice Patch shoe. “Why did people lose their footwear in the snow? They probably didn’t – the shoes are worn out and probably thrown away as rubbish. Well, we don’t think this shoe is rubbish.”

There was a lot of ice melt in 2019. We were busy rescuing finds from the Lendbreen pass and other sites. Just before winter snow arrived, we received an exciting photo from the Horse Ice Patch pass from a mountain hiker. Isn’t that an Iron Age shoe? We rushed to the pass.

“It’s easy to joke about a roman tourist who didn’t quite understand much about the country he was visiting”, Finstad says.

“But in any case, I believe the people who walked these routes most likely knew what they were doing. They would have worn something inside this shoe that made it work. Perhaps scraps of fabric or animal skin”.

As the ice melts, scientists hope to uncover many more ancient items that may offer clues to those who visited the Lendbreen ice patch in ancient times.