A groundbreaking study published by an international team, including faculty from Binghamton University, State University of New York, has documented the first known case of Down syndrome in Neanderthals. This discovery sheds new light on the social behaviors of our ancient relatives, revealing their capacity for altruistic care and support for vulnerable members within their … Read more
The Celtic culture of the pre-Roman Iron Age in Western and Central Europe has left numerous traces to this day, not least in the form of enormous burial mounds and spectacular archaeological artifacts. Despite this rich legacy, much about this civilization remains hidden from us. In a collaboration between the State Office for the Preservation … Read more
A new Netflix documentary has recreated the face of a 75,000-year-old female Neanderthal whose flattened skull was discovered and rebuilt from hundreds of bone fragments by a team of archaeologists and conservators led by the University of Cambridge. The team excavated the female Neanderthal in 2018 from inside a cave in Iraqi Kurdistan where the … Read more
For sports fans, places like Fenway Park, Wembley Stadium or Wimbledon’s Centre Court are practically hallowed ground. Archaeologists at the University of Cincinnati found evidence of similar reverence at ballcourts built by the ancient Maya in Mexico. Using environmental DNA analysis, researchers identified a collection of plants used in ceremonial rituals in the ancient Maya … Read more
Ancient genomes from the herpes virus that commonly causes lip sores—and currently infects some 3.7 billion people globally—have been uncovered and sequenced for the first time by an international team of scientists led by the University of Cambridge. Latest research suggests that the HSV-1 virus strain behind facial herpes as we know it today arose … Read more
The transition from the fifth to the fourth century BCE (Before the Common Era) seems to have been a critical period for the Central Andes, a region now part of Peru. Researchers have found evidence of turbulence during the passage from the Middle Formative period (1200–400 BCE) to the Late Formative period (400–1 BCE). Political … Read more
Living in close quarters without access to antibiotics may seem like a nightmare scenario, yet for much of human history and prehistory, it was a reality. A groundbreaking international study, coordinated from the Centre for Palaeogenetics in Stockholm, delves into the microbial landscape of the Stone Age in Scandinavia, shedding light on the microbial communities … Read more
In a groundbreaking excavation at the Boncuklu Tarla site in southeastern Türkiye, archaeologists have unearthed a treasure trove of human history dating back an astonishing 11,000 years. The discovery? Evidence of body perforation, shedding new light on the rituals and practices of early sedentary communities. The findings, meticulously analyzed by a team from Ankara University, … Read more
Archaeologists differentiate between different periods of human prehistory through a combination of chronological dating methods, material culture analysis, stratigraphy, and interdisciplinary research. Human prehistory encompasses vast spans of time, ranging from the emergence of our earliest ancestors millions of years ago to the advent of written records around 5,000 years ago. During this long and … Read more
The discovery of Ötzi the Iceman, one of the most remarkable archaeological finds of the 20th century, has provided invaluable insights into the lives of prehistoric humans and has sparked widespread interest and intrigue among scientists and the general public alike. Ötzi, named after the Ötztal Alps where his remains were found, is a remarkably … Read more
Early hunter–gatherers from the Middle Stone Age in southern Africa were selecting the most suitable material available for stone tools and spearheads more than 60,000 years ago, according to a study by Dr. Patrick Schmidt from the University of Tübingen’s Early Prehistory and Quaternary Ecology section. Researchers involved in the study used a specially developed … Read more
Neanderthals created stone tools held together by a multi-component adhesive, a team of scientists has discovered. Its findings, which are the earliest evidence of a complex adhesive in Europe, suggest these predecessors to modern humans had a higher level of cognition and cultural development than previously thought. The work, reported in the journal Science Advances, … Read more