Coins buried during the English Civil War found on the farm
A plowed farmer’s field in England is notable not because of crops, but because of coins.
A trove of over 1,000 coins dating to the English Civil War has been discovered in a field near the British village Ewerby, according to a report from Lincolnshire County Council.
The coins are relics from a time long past, with the most recent being from 1643. While a buried pot originally held them, they were reportedly found distributed throughout the soil.
This is the largest of the hoards that have been found from that time in the county, and it contains coins from the reigns of Edward VI, Elizabeth, Mary, James I, and Charles I
“This is a monumental find from the turbulent years of the English Civil War,” Adam Daubney, finds officer for the Portable Antiquities Scheme at Lincolnshire County Council, said in a statement.
The English Civil War spanned from 1642 to 1651, with the Royalists fighting with the Parliamentarians. It concluded with a Parliamentarian victory, and the execution of King Charles I.
“The area between Grantham and Boston was a zone of intense conflict between the Parliamentarians and the Royalists in the early years of the war, so we can think of the Ewerby hoard as being from the ‘front-line,’” Daubney said.
“The hoard tells us about the uncertainty and fear that must have been felt at the time, but quite why it was buried – and by whom – is impossible to say,” he added. “It might have been buried by someone who went off to fight and never returned.”
The value of the coins at the time was a little over £34, which was a substantial amount— more than enough for a “gentleman” of the era to subsist off for a year, according to Daubney.
The buried treasure was discovered in a ploughed field near the village of Ewerby near Sleaford in Lincolnshire
Eighteenth-Century Artifacts Uncovered in Michigan
Excavators working at Mackinac State Historic Parks have uncovered a heart-shaped ring, a sleeve button made of glass or crystal, a gunflint, a plain pewter button, a plain brass button, and part of a bone knife handle at the site of a house at Colonial Michilimackinac, a fort first established by French traders and missionaries on Mackinac Island.
An intact heart-shaped ring was found during the beginning of the 2020 archaeological season at Colonial Michilimackinac.
Researchers discovered what seems to be an intaglio bottle, or perhaps the quartz, jacket ring, according to Dr. Lynn Evans, curator of archaeology for Mackinac State Historic Parks
“We are not sure who the figure is, but it appears to be a Classical figure, which might have appealed to an educated man of the eighteenth century.
It was found in what we believe to be the second cellar of the house, where we have been finding British-era artifacts.
An intaglio glass, or possibly crystal, sleeve button (cuff link) was also found during one of the first archaeological digs of the 2020 season at Colonial Michilimackinac.
We have found other intaglios at Michilimackinac, including another one at this house, but the others have all been round and appear to have been busted in the style of the eighteenth century.
An intaglio glass, or possibly crystal, sleeve button (cuff link) was also found during one of the first archaeological digs of the 2020 season at Colonial Michilimackinac. (Mackinac State Historic Parks)
Archaeologists also found a gunflint, a plain pewter button, and part of a bone handle from a knife in the root cellar in House E of the Southeast Rowhouse.
Along with the findings, two horizontal planks, perhaps the floor, are starting to be exposed, said Evans.
A plain brass button and an intact heart-shaped trade ring have also been exposed in the same area.
The archaeological dig at Michilimackinac began in 1959, making it one of the longest-running archaeology programs in North America. House E was first occupied by Charles Henri Desjardins de Rupallay de Gonneville, and later by an as-yet-unidentified English trader.
Up to 500 guillotine victims found in walls of French monument
The bodies of nearly 500 people, including Maximilien Robespierre, an architect of the reign of terror, guillotined during the French Revolution have been believed to have buried in Paris ‘ catacombs.
Yet recent research indicates that these individuals may have been laid to rest elsewhere: namely, in the walls of Chapelle Expiatoire, a 19th-century chapel in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, reports Eric Le Mitouard for Le Parisien.
Many of the deceased were aristocrats publicly beheaded between 1793 and 1794 in the Place de la Révolution, a huge public square now known as the Place de la Concorde.
Madame du Barry, mistress of Louis XV, and Olympe de Gouges, an influential early feminist writer and social reformer, are among those thought to be interred at the mass burial site.
In 2018, Chapelle Expiatoire’s administrator, Aymeric Peniguet de Stoutz, noticed that the walls in the lower chapel’s columns were strangely uneven, as though there were extra spaces between them.
When archaeologist Philippe Charlier investigated the discrepancy by inserting a tiny camera through the stones in the walls, he discovered four large chests containing bones, reports Kim Willsher for the Guardian.
More than 500 people guillotined during the French Revolution may have been buried in the walls of this 19th-century chapel.
Further research on the findings was delayed, in part due to the Yellow Vest protests that erupted in Paris that year. Now, however, Peniguet de Stoutz tells Le Parisien that he has asked the regional directorate of cultural affairs to conduct excavations at the site beginning in 2021.
“I cried when the forensic pathologist assured me he had seen human phalange [feet and hand] bones in the photographs,” the administrator says, per a translation by the Guardian.
Louis XVIII built the Chapelle Expiatoire on the site of the Madeleine Cemetery where his brother Louis XVI and sister-in-law Marie Antoinette were once buried.
In his report, Charlier noted that the lower chapel contained four wooden ossuaries, or containers used to hold human remains.
“There is earth mixed with fragments of bones,” he wrote, as quoted by the Guardian.
Chapelle Expiatoire is located around a ten-minute walk from the Place de la Révolution. It was constructed on top of the former Madeleine Cemetery, which served as one of four officially designated burial sites for guillotine victims through 1794.
When Louis XVIII became king in 1814, he ordered the remains of his brother Louis XVI and sister-in-law Marie Antoinette removed from the Madeleine Cemetery and interred in the Saint-Denis Basilica, according to David Chazan of the Telegraph.
The French monarch commissioned the Chapelle Expiatoire’s construction atop of the burial site in memory of the couple.
Previously, historians thought that the remains of other notable victims of the French Revolution were moved from the Madeleine Cemetery to another site and, finally, to the catacombs of Paris, where a plaque commemorates their burial. If confirmed, the newly detailed discovery would refute that narrative.
Peniguet de Stoutz cites evidence that Louis XVIII did not want the aristocrats’ bodies to be moved out of the building. In a letter, the king reportedly ordered that “no earth saturated with victims [of the revolution] be moved from the place for the building of the work.”
Speaking with Le Parisien, the chapel administrator says, “Until now, the chapel was thought to be solely a monument in memory of the royal family. But we’ve just discovered that it is also a necropolis of the revolution.”
15,000 Years Ago, Humans in Israel Ate Snakes and Lizards
New research suggests ancient humans living in what is now Israel regularly dined on lizards and snakes, reports Luke Tress for the Times of Israel.
These people may have developed a taste for reptiles in order to find enough food as they transitioned to living in more permanent settlements ahead of the advent of agriculture.
Published last week in the journal Scientific Reports, the study examines 15,000-year-old fossilized lizard and snake bones found at the el-Wad Terrace cave near Mount Carmel in Israel. El-Wad is situated within the Nahal Me’arot Nature Preserve, which contains a network of caves that provides a window into 500,000 years of human evolution, according to Unesco.
Researchers with the University of Haifa dig up Natufian remains in the Mount Carmel area of northern Israel.
The research centers on excavations at a more recent site attributed to the Natufian culture, which was active in modern-day Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, and Palestine between 15,000 and 11,500 years ago, per the University of Haifa’s Zinman Institute of Archaeology.
The Natufians are thought to be among the first humans to construct permanent houses and cultivate plants as food, reported Daniel K. Eisenbud for the Jerusalem Post in 2017.
To date, digs at the el-Wad cave have yielded flint and grinding tools, human burials, architectural remains, and animal bones. Though archaeologists can use markings on the bones of larger animals like rabbits or bears to discern if they were butchered for human consumption, smaller lizard and snake bones are more difficult to assess, according to the Times of Israel.
“From the beginning, our excavations in the site of el-Wad Terrace revealed lots of bones of snakes and lizards, usually the vertebras,” study co-author Reuven Yeshurun, an archaeologist at the Universit of Haifa, tells Rossella Tercatin of the Jerusalem Post. “We found them almost every day. We became really curious to understand if people ate them or if they had gotten there by some other process.”
Vertebrates of reptiles studied by University of Haifa archaeologists
To investigate the reptilian vertebrae’s origins, the team conducted a rather unorthodox set of experiments aimed at determining how different processes changed the bones’ structure and appearance.
“We roasted modern snakes’ vertebras in the oven; we tried to chop them and so forth,” Yeshurun tells the Jerusalem Post.
He and his colleagues also exposed the bones to acids that approximated digestion, trampled them, and exposed them to various weather conditions.
After comparing the modern bones with the ancient samples, the researchers posited that the Natufians did, in fact, dine on the many snakes and lizards found near their settlements. Per the paper, reptile species on the group’s menu included the European glass lizard and the large whipsnake.
The legless European glass lizard (Pseudopus apodus) was likely a part of the ancient human diet.
“They were still hunter-gatherers and did not know how to produce food, but they still lived in permanent small communities,” the team tells the Jerusalem Post.
“For this reason, they really needed to come up with numerous methods to procure food. One of the things they did was capturing and eating almost everything. Now we can add a new item to their menu.”
The reptile remains found at el-Wad may represent a combination of leftovers from ancient feasts and animal bones that accumulated naturally over time, reports the Jerusalem Post.
Though the team detected signs of human consumption on nonpoisonous species’ remains, they were unable to identify similar markings on poisonous species, suggesting these reptiles may have died of natural causes.
“We know from historical sources that people ate snakes in the Middle Ages, but until now there was no evidence that they did so 15,000 years ago,” Yeshurun tells the Times of Israel. “It’s very possible that with the help of the method we have developed we’ll find even earlier evidence.”
New Plant Identified in 1,400-Year-Old Pipe in Washington
Rhus glabra, a herb commonly known as smooth sumac, was smoked by people in the Washington State more than 1.400 years ago.
The finding was made by a team of researchers from the State University of Washington is the first time scientists in an archeological pipe have detected the remains of a non-tobacco plant. Who would have thought tobacco-free alternatives would have been so popular all those years ago? This discovery is pretty remarkable.
The Native American pipe, unearthed in Central Washington, also contained residues N. quadrivalvis, a tobacco species currently not cultivated in the area but which is believed to have been widely grown in the past. Until now, Ancient people in the American Northwest had only thought about using special smoking herb mixtures.
Replica pipes used to experimentally “smoke” tobacco and other native plants in WSU laboratories for the study. The charred residue is then extracted, chemically “fingerprinted”, and compared to the residue of ancient archaeological pipes.
“Smoking often played a religious or ceremonial role for Native American tribes and our research shows these specific plants were important to these communities in the past,” said Korey Brownstein, a former WSU Ph.D. student now at the University of Chicago and lead author of a study on the research in the journal Frontiers in Molecular Biosciences. “We think the Rhus glabra may have been mixed with tobacco for its medicinal qualities and to improve the flavor of smoke.”
The discovery was made possible by a new metabolomics-based analysis method that can detect thousands of plant compounds or metabolites in residue collected from pipes, bowls, and other archeological artifacts. The compounds can then be used to identify which plants were smoked or consumed.
“Not only does it tell you, yes, you found the plant you’re interested in, but it also can tell you what else was being smoked,” said David Gang, a professor in WSU’s Institute of Biological Chemistry and a co-author of the study. “It wouldn’t be hyperbole to say that this technology represents a new frontier in archaeo-chemistry.”
Previously, the identification of ancient plant residues relied on the detection of a limited number of biomarkers, such as nicotine, anabasine, cotinine, and caffeine. Gang said the issue with this approach is while the presence of a biomarker like nicotine shows tobacco was smoked it doesn’t distinguish which species it was.
“Also, if you are only looking for a few specific biomarkers, you aren’t going to be able to tell what else was consumed in the artifact,” Gang said.
In addition to identifying the first non-tobacco plant smoked in an archaeological pipe, the WSU researchers’ work also helps elucidate the complex evolution of tobacco trade in the American Northwest.
Analysis of a second pipe that was used by people living in Central Washington after Euro-American contact revealed the presence of a different tobacco species, N. Rustica, which was grown by native peoples on the east coast of what is now the United States.
“Our findings show Native American communities interacted widely with one another within and between ecological regions, including the trade of tobacco seeds and materials,” said Shannon Tushingham, an assistant professor of anthropology at WSU and co-author of the study.
“The research also casts doubt on the commonly held view that trade tobacco grown by Europeans overtook the use of natively-grown smoke plants after Euro-American contact.”
Moving forward, the WSU researchers’ work could ultimately help scientists studying ancient societies in the Americas and elsewhere around the globe identify which plant species ancient people were consuming, providing important information about the evolution of drug use and similar plant-human dynamics.
Closer to home, the WSU team is also putting their work to use helping confirm connections between ancient plant management practices from before the arrival of Western settlers with cultural traditions of modern indigenous communities such as the Nez Perce.
The researchers shared their work with members of the tribe who also used some of the seeds from the study to grow some of the pre-contact tobacco.
The smoking of tobacco is a sacred tradition for Native American groups including the Nez Perce, Colville, and other northwest Tribes and before now it was impossible to tell which kind of tobacco their ancestors smoked.
“We took over an entire greenhouse to grow these plants and collected millions of seeds so that the Nez Perce people could reintroduce these native plants back onto their land,” Brownstein said.
“I think these kinds of projects are so important because they help build trust between us and tribal communities and show that we can work together to make discoveries.”
The stunning 3D face of ‘jawless’ Stone Age man whose head was found on a SPIKE revealed
It is likely that the world never understands why the head of the man from Stone Age is on a stake and tossed into an underwater grave, but now it will see his face.
The technology of 3D face reconstruction was used by a forensic artist to put together the features on an 8,000-year-old jawless skull to depict one individual with a pointy nose, a broad stir, and a long beard. The facial muscles and skin were formed using different factors such as the man’s weight, height, and ethnicity.
The skull was one of at least 12, including an infant, found in what was once a prehistoric lake in Sweden and experts believe the group may have been murdered during an ancient ritual.
In a note, Nilsson said to DailyMail.com: ‘ I rebuilt the face with a forensic reconstruction technique based on the expected depth of tissue of several anatomic landmarks of the skull alongside the rebuilding of the facial muscles. ‘
‘There are also reliable techniques to reconstruct specific parts of the face: the nose, the eyes and the mouth, from information and traces on the skull.’
The original findings, from researchers at Stockholm University and Sweden’s Cultural Heritage Foundation (CHF) in 2018, is the first evidence that Stone Age hunter-gatherers displayed heads on wooden spikes.
‘Here, we have an example of a very complex ritual, which is very structured,’ lead researcher Dr Fredrik Hallgren, from CHF, told Daily Mail.
‘Even though we can’t decipher the meaning of the ritual, we can still appreciate the complexity of it, of these prehistoric hunter-gatherers.’
Why this man, and the others, met such a horrific death may stay a mystery, but Oscar Nilsson, a Sweden-based forensic artist, has shown us what the ancient victim looked like.
The jawless skull (pictured) was one of at least 12, including an infant, found in what was once a prehistoric lake in Sweden and experts believe the group may have been murdered during an ancient ritual.
‘The Stone Age, and the Mesolithic period, is absolutely a favorite period for me. However these individuals from the Mesolithic genetically are so alike us today, the culture, the way they saw their world yet are so different from our understanding, beliefs, and values. So alike, but so distant,’ explained Nilsson.
‘Moreover, the finding from Motala is so special: the skulls of 10 individuals were placed on wooden poles, just above the ancient lakes´surface.
‘Furthermore, they all had several healed traumas from violence. Stone Age was violent, but this is something else, one can almost suspect that the violence was ritual. Unusually frequent anyway.’
Also, his DNA was so well preserved that it was possible to get information on the colors of hair, eyes, and skin. Nilsson took a computer tomography scan of the skull and printed a 3D replica in vinyl plastic, Daily Mail reported.
Because the jaw was missing from the skull, he had to take a measurement of where it once was in order to reconstruct it. Although there is no evidence of what the man wore, Nilsson made choices on the wardrobe and haircut based on items found in the grave.
Archaeologists uncovered remains from a range of animals including brown bears, wild boars, red deer, moose, and roe deer. The man’s hair was reconstructed to be short with a longer portion pulled back in a small ponytail.
Meanwhile, the white chalk decorating the man’s chest is a piece of artistic license, based on the fact that many Indigenous groups today use chalk for body paint, Nilsson said.
‘It’s a reminder we cannot understand their aesthetic taste, just observe it.’ We have no reason to believe these people were less interested in their looks, and to express their individuality than we are today.’
Researchers uncovered the man’s skull, along with the 12 others, in 2018. Seven of the adults likely died in agony and had suffered serious trauma to their head before they died, which researchers suggest were the result of non-lethal, violent blows.
The finding is the first evidence that Stone Age hunter-gatherers displayed heads on wooden spikes. The gruesome discovery challenges our understanding of European Stone Age culture and how these early humans handled their dead, experts said
These may have been the result of interpersonal violence, forced abduction, warfare, and aids of socially-sanctioned violence between group members. The bodies were placed atop a densely packed layer of large stones in what would have been an elaborate underwater burial between 7,500 and 8,500 years ago.
Only one of the bodies still had a jawbone when it was buried, which experts suggest were removed as part of the burial ritual.
Mass 16th-century grave reveals grim remains of over 100 children with coins in their mouths
In Southeast Poland the bodies of more than 100 children were found, some with coins in their mouths. It verified the local legends of the child’s graveyard.
Archeologists revealed a total of 115 bodies following the discovery of human bones by construction workers during work on the S19 road in Jeżowe, Nizko in Podkarpackie province.
As reported, the National Roads and Motorways Directorate-General said: ‘ Around 70 – 80% of all burial sites, based on archeological discoveries to date, are infants.
The remains were uncovered by archaeologists after construction workers discovered human bones during roadworks.
When archaeologists looked more closely at the bodies they were amazed to find some of them had coins placed in their mouths.
Katarzyna Oleszek, an archaeologist working at the site, said: “It’s certainly a sign of their beliefs. The coins are called obols of the dead or Charon’s obol. It is an old, pre-Christian tradition. But it’s been cultivated for a long time, even as late as the nineteenth century, it was practiced by Pope Pius IX.”
Charon’s obol is a term for a coin placed in the mouth of a dead person before burial. The tradition goes back to ancient Greece and Rome. The coin was a payment or bribe for Charon, the ferryman who conveyed souls across the river that divided the world of the living from the world of the dead.
The bodies found in Jeżowe do not date that far back, however. The coins found were minted in the time of Sigismund III Vasa, who was the king of Poland from 1587 to 1632. Also found were coins known as boratynki, which date from the reign of John II Casimir from 1648 to 1668.
The find confirms archaeologists’ theories and the speculations of locals that children were buried in a cemetery in an area known as the Church Mountains.
Apart from the coins, no other items were found in the graves. There were no buttons, nails, or coffin handles, which Oleszek says suggests that the community that buried them was very poor.
The area is now forested and there are no grave markers. Only a small chapel offers any sign of the former church.
Oleszek said: “The arrangement of the skeletons, the state of their preservation, shows that the discovery is a Catholic church cemetery, which was certainly taken care of. No grave is damaged by another. The inhabitants knew exactly where they had graves and took care of them.”
Oleszek said, “We know from sources that during a visit of the bishops of Kraków here in Jeżowe 1604 there was already a large parish church, with a garden, a rectory, a school, and a cemetery. It probably existed already since 1590.”
The bodies were found in sandy ground and were arranged on an east-west axis, all with heads to the west on their backs with the hands at their sides. The graves are most likely those from the children’s section of the graveyard.
One grave contains the bodies of four children. They lay in close formation but not on top of each other. All their heads are resting to one side in the same direction. The fourth child, on the edge of the group, is much younger than the others.
“The arrangement of the skeletons, the state of their preservation, shows that the discovery is a Catholic church cemetery, which was certainly taken care of. No grave is damaged by another. The inhabitants knew exactly where they had graves and took care of them,” said Oleszek.
The bodies will be exhumed and after being studied by anthropologists they will be passed to the local parish church and buried again in the local cemetery.
Most of the bodies were buried in individual graves and the original order and layout of the graves will be preserved. The group of four children will again be buried together.
The bodies were discovered during work on a section of the S19 motorway, which is part of the Via Carpatia project that will link the Baltic states with south-eastern Europe.
In Poland, the route runs through Podlasie, Mazovia, Lublin, and Podkarpacie and is set to be over 700 km long.
17th-Century Artifacts Found at Soldiers’ Barracks in Ireland
Unearthing at the Athlone Garda Station on Barrack Street offered an insight into the life of a soldier from the 17th century 17th-century soldier in the town.
The archaeological findings suggest that the soldiers’ rowdy ways included drinking, smoking, and gambling on blood sports at the barracks site.
The first soldiers were stationed in Athlone during the foundation of Custume Barracks, formerly Victoria Barracks, around 1690.
This week, outgoing Minister of State for the Office of Public Works (OPW), Kevin ‘Boxer’ Moran, announced several interesting finds unearthed during monitored excavation works by Angela Wallace, of Atlantic Archaeology, as part of the Athlone Garda Station redevelopment.
Several artifacts were discovered recently, amidst a perfectly-preserved cobbled area and courtyard surface.
A number of artifacts dating back to the 17th century have been discovered at a building site in Westmeath.
The OPW said the items uncovered “ranged from coins to musket balls, to a thimble and a hair comb, and fragments of clay pipes and glassware, as well as military buttons, uniform buckles, and interesting animal bones.”
These objects “suggest the soldiers had time away from the stresses of battle and controlling the colonies to indulge in drinking, smoking and gambling on blood sports.”
Zoo-archaeologist Siobhan Duffy identified a lower leg-bone from a male chicken which had the characteristic spur sawn off at approximately mid-way along its length.
“This procedure would have been carried out during the bird’s life, to facilitate the attachment of an artificial spur for the purposes of cockfighting,” Ms. Duffy explained.
At that time, cockfighting was a potentially lucrative enterprise, regarded as a sport worthy of the powerful elite.
The OPW said the discovery of many clay pipe fragments, dating between 1640 and 1670, along with fragments of fine 17th-century glassware, reinforced the theory that elite-status activities had been happening on Athlone the site.
Further evidence of this was seen in the excavation of a fine-toothed bone comb and clay curler, as many soldiers during the time wore their hair closely shaven, to avoid lice infestations, while more senior officers wore grand wigs.
The OPW has emphasized the significance of the Athlone finds.
“To date, there has been no other extensive excavation carried out on a military barracks in Ireland that has produced such a wide range of artifacts and ecofacts informing us of the social and domestic activities of soldiers during this period,” it stated this week.