The moai statues of Easter Island have long presented an enigma for researchers wondering how the ancient Rapa Nui people managed to move these enormous monoliths around the island. And now, a team of anthropologists believes they may finally have the answer—by way of some rather bizarre physics experiments. In a recent Journal of Archaeological […]
Oldest Shell Jewelry Workshop in Western Europe Dates Back 42,000 Years
Between 55,000 and 42,000 years ago, the Châtelperronian people lived in what is now modern-day France and northern Spain. Their tool industry is among the earliest known from this part of the world during the Upper Paleolithic, a time spanning 55,000 and 42,000 years ago. And as new research suggests, Châtelperronians also had a knack […]
The Land Bridge You’ve Never Heard Of
For many of us, when we think of land bridges, we tend to think of the Bering Land Bridge (actually more of a swamp), which ancient humans traversed to reach North America from modern-day Siberia during the last Ice Age. But there may have been another, crucial stretch of land that aided early human migration—this […]
New Study Questions a Major Assumption About the Fall of the Roman Empire
The period after the Roman Empire abandoned Britain has long been known as the “Dark Ages” for a reason. Scholars believed that after the Romans left, local industries collapsed and effectively all progress ceased for centuries. Britain, they theorized, was plunged into a cultural and economic abyss with their departure. But for some time, a […]
Bronze Age Britons Threw Massive Ragers With Food and Friends From Far Away
You can learn a lot about people by studying their trash, including populations that lived thousands of years ago. In what the team calls the “largest study of its kind,” researchers applied this principle to Britain’s iconic middens, or giant prehistoric trash (excuse me, rubbish) piles. Their analysis revealed that at the end of the […]
Prehistoric Skull Found Fused to Cave Wall May Have Belonged to Mysterious Ancient Hominid
In 1960, a villager found something terrifyingly creepy in Greece’s Petralona cave—a humanoid cranium with a protrusion on its forehead, fused to the cave wall. Since then, researchers have been trying to date the strange specimen and understand how it got there, but these efforts so far have yielded only a frustratingly broad age range […]
Newly Discovered Fossils Reveal Unknown Humanlike Relative
Researchers have uncovered fossils belonging to a previously unknown ancient human relative. And they may have lived in the same time and place as the earliest-known members of the genus Homo, from which modern humans evolved, according to a new study. A team of archeologists working at Ethiopia’s Ledi-Geraru research project area unearthed a set […]
1,600-Year-Old Depiction of Roman Flip-Flops Look So Real It Makes You Want to Wear Them
The ancient estate of Villa Romana del Casale in Sicily is known for featuring some of the most beautiful examples of Roman mosaics preserved in their original location. As if the site wasn’t already famous enough, researchers and students have uncovered a mosaic of sandals so modern-looking they could be straight out of a Havaianas […]
After Mount Vesuvius Demolished Pompeii, People Returned to Live Among the Ruins
In 79 CE, Mount Vesuvius erupted in what would become one of humanity’s most infamous ancient tragedies. Tens of centuries later, archaeologists eagerly dug through the ash and pumice to rediscover the buried Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in all their preserved glory. In their eagerness, however, they may have missed an important layer […]
Impossibly Intricate Tattoos Found on 2,000-Year-Old ‘Ice Mummy’
For the first time, archeologists have gotten a detailed look at the intricate tattoos on a 2,000-year-old ice mummy, found buried deep within the permafrost-covered mountains of Siberia. These tattoos would be challenging to produce even today, the researchers say, suggesting that ancient tattoo artists possessed a considerable degree of skill. With help from modern […]