Archaeology

Archaeology

Ivory from a 16th century shipwreck reveals new details about African elephants

Ivory from the sunken Portuguese trading ship Bom Jesus contains clues about elephant herds that once roamed Africa, and the people who hunted them.

Archaeology

Ancient people may have survived desert droughts by melting ice in lava tubes

Bands of charcoal from fires lit long ago, found in an ice core from a New Mexico cave, correspond to five periods of drought over 800 years.

Archaeology

Two stones fuel debate over when America’s first settlers arrived

Stones possibly used to break mastodon bones 130,000 years ago in what is now California get fresh scrutiny.

Humans

Ancient humans may have deliberately voyaged to Japan’s Ryukyu Islands

Satellite-tracked buoys suggest that long ago, a remote Japanese archipelago was reached by explorers on purpose, not accidentally.

Archaeology

The biblical warrior Goliath may not have been so giant after all

Archaeological finds suggest the width of the walls of Goliath’s home city were used to metaphorically represent the Old Testament figure’s height.

Anthropology

Female big-game hunters may have been surprisingly common in the ancient Americas

A Peruvian burial that indicates that women speared large prey as early as 9,000 years ago sheds new light on gender roles of ancient hunter-gatherers.

Anthropology

These human nerve cell tendrils turned to glass nearly 2,000 years ago

Part of a young man’s brain was preserved in A.D. 79 by hot ash from Mount Vesuvius’ eruption.

Anthropology

Mummified llamas yield new insights into Inca ritual sacrifices

Bound and decorated llamas, found at an Inca site in southern Peru, may have been buried alive as part of events in annexed territories.

Anthropology

How environmental changes may have helped make ancient humans more adaptable

An East African sediment core unveils ecological changes underlying a key Stone Age transition.

Archaeology

Bones from an Iron Age massacre paint a violent picture of prehistoric Europe

Bones left unburied, and in one case still wearing jewelry, after a massacre add to evidence that prehistoric Europe was a violent place.

Humans

Drones find signs of a Native American ‘Great Settlement’ beneath a Kansas pasture

An earthwork buried under a cattle ranch may be part of one of the largest Native American settlements ever established north of Mexico.

Archaeology

Stonehenge enhanced sounds like voices or music for people inside the monument

Scientists created a scale model one-twelfth the size of the ancient stone circle to study its acoustics.