Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 25 Nov 21 - 03:15 PM

Decorated ivory 'pendant' carved from mammoth tusk is oldest example of ornate j jewellery in Eurasia, archaeologists say

but it could also be a boomerang!

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Bill D
Date: 26 Nov 21 - 07:44 PM

Just keeps coming..
https://www.npr.org/2021/11/26/1059341809/leicester-england-archaeologists-ancient-roman-mosaic

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 27 Nov 21 - 01:57 AM

it does indeed -

p.s. there's a really good typo in the report - The mosaic is believed to date back to the late Roman Empire, roughly 250-450 BCE, and is part of a massive villa complex buried beneath a farmer's field.

Looks like your newspapers/news organisations were not the only ones to dispense with that un-necessary occupation - the proofreader!

According to Professor Google (who of course knows everything) the late Roman Empire was AD (using the old Christian dating) or CE (using the newer, all-embracing category!)

Pedants like me had fun after our local papers cut out those unneeded staff members ...

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Nov 21 - 06:32 AM

Even as a dyed-in-the-wool atheist I'm still more than happy to stick with BC and AD! I mean, 'common era" - I mean, qu'est-ce que c'est que ça!

(Even though Jesus was apparently born several years BC...). ;-)

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 27 Nov 21 - 07:16 AM

the Census was 4BC if I remember correctly - that is, remembering my reading of Ancient History, not any personal memories ...

sandra

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Dec 21 - 09:23 AM

I am delighted to learn that a civilization centralized near present day St. Louis built pyramids of clay existed during the decline of the Mayan cities and was bigger than European cities in 1,000 AD.
They extended their civilization via the Mississippi.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Dec 21 - 10:30 AM

I fear that the main remnants of those cultures are the mounds that are contained in various state and national parks.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Bill D
Date: 13 Dec 21 - 12:04 PM

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mound_Builders#Archaeological_surveys

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 15 Dec 21 - 07:06 AM

Fossil discovery shows some Australian 'thunder birds' had painful bone infection before species went extinct.
Around 50,000 years ago, a giant flightless bird roamed the open woodlands and lake edges of southern Australia.
This mihirung paringmal (giant bird), sometimes called a "thunder bird" (Genyoris newtoni), weighed five to six times that of an emu, was 2 metres tall, and had a huge beak.
But what caused the demise of the species isn't entirely settled. read on)

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Dec 21 - 07:26 AM

It is suspected that climate change caused the civilization to no longer grow corn all year around and that floods became severe.
https://cahokiamounds.org/

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 15 Dec 21 - 04:13 PM

Rare Roman crucifixion victim found in UK ... Only one other Roman crucifixion has been confirmed with human remains, a man who died in Israel in the 1st century ...

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 19 Dec 21 - 05:48 PM

Ancient jar that may have been used to anoint Anglo-Saxon kings is found after 1,000 years underground in hoard of treasure 'buried to hide it from Vikings'

    Experts found 'extraordinary' Roman rock crystal jar in Viking-era treasure hoard found buried in Scotland
    Galloway Hoard has more than 100 objects including bracelets, brooches, a gold ring and a Christian cross
    Derek McLennan, a retired businessman and metal detectorist, found the stash at Kirkcudbrightshire in 2014
    The jar was wrapped in delicate gold thread by the finest medieval craftsman in late 8th or early 9th century

lots of amazing pics!

one of us posted something about the Galloway Hoard at some stage since this thread started in Jan 2018, but Google just throws me to the whole thread! ... Scuttering beneath the floorboards, the rats hoarded scraps of fabric, ... Conserving the Galloway Hoard - it was in an urn & wrapped in textiles

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Helen
Date: 19 Dec 21 - 06:47 PM

Was the "someone" who posted about the Galloway Hoard you??

Sandra in Sydney - PM Date: 13 Dec 20 - 07:52 AM

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 19 Dec 21 - 11:04 PM

did you read every post, or does your google search go to the exact post? I used firefox & chrome, I searched both phrases - Galloway Hoard + Scuttering beneath the floorboards

sandra

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 19 Dec 21 - 11:09 PM

here's one of the articles I posted - updated

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Helen
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 12:48 AM

Oh yeah, I definitely read every post! LOL - Not.

The Google brought up the whole thread, not the divided sections, and then I just used the Edit/Find in Page function on the toolbar.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 20 Dec 21 - 04:30 PM

Edit/Find in Page function???

Mudcat is a great place to learn stuff!

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 21 Dec 21 - 04:27 PM

Scientists find perfectly preserved dinosaur embryo preparing to hatch like bird

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 04:53 PM

World’s oldest family tree revealed in 5,700-year-old Cotswolds tomb ... The researchers have discovered that 27 were biological relatives from five continuous generations of a single extended family. The majority were descended from four women who all had children with the same man. ...

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 04:01 PM

First Human Skeleton From Bronze Age Tsunami Discovered in Turkey
Archaeologists find remains of a young man and dog left behind by a natural disaster some 3,600 years ago in the Mediterranean

A massive volcanic eruption in the Mediterranean Sea some 3,600 years ago might just be the worst natural disaster in human history. The event contributed to the decline of Minoan culture on Thera—now the Greek island of Santorini—and also created a huge tsunami that demolished communities all along the sea’s coastline.

For the first time, archaeologists in Turkey have found an articulated human skeleton in the debris field left behind by the tsunami, reports Maya Margit for the Media Line. The researchers made the discovery and published their findings in the peer-reviewed journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 08:12 PM

Santorini is an amazing place - from pics I hasten to add, I've never been there.

The 10 Most Exciting and Extraordinary Artifact Finds Of 2021

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 06 Jan 22 - 08:25 PM

forgot to add this

Pompeii of the East: 4,000 year-old victims of Chinese earthquake includes pic of Pompeii victims

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Jan 22 - 11:10 AM

oops something went wrong with that interesting link

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Jan 22 - 11:16 AM

Fixed it. There have been a couple of broken links lately - usually because the last few characters of the link were chopped off.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 10 Jan 22 - 04:46 PM

oops I forgot to check it - DaveRo's simple linkifier created after I had trouble blickying a long URL

Medieval warhorses no bigger than modern-day ponies, study finds but I checked this & it works.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 06:27 AM

UK's biggest railway project = biggest archaeology project - HS2 - national high-speed railway linking London, Birmingham, Leeds   ... Helen Wass, HS2’s head of heritage, said: “Archaeology is a double-edged sword. We wouldn’t be doing it if construction wasn’t happening. You can’t have one without the other. We make sure that if construction happens, we record our heritage to the best of our ability.”

latest discovery - ‘Exquisite’ wooden Roman figure found on HS2 dig in Buckinghamshire ...The carved wooden figure was “a fantastic find”, said Pitt. “It’s really rare to get Roman carved woodwork in Britain. Even in its fractured, weathered state, it has something in the pose of the figure and in the dress that says this is probably Roman.”

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 12:47 PM

Off to the side on the stories you link to there are always other gems. The Guardian does a good job of reporting these discoveries. You may have shared this one, in which case I missed it (from October last year).

‘Astounding’ Roman statues unearthed at Norman church ruins on route of HS2
Heads of man, woman and child found on site of Stoke Mandeville church built in 1080 and abandoned 800 years later

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 12:59 PM

And, upon taking a dive back to late 2021 I didn't find that link, but I did find one that Don and Sandra referred to but didn't actually share.

A Mosaic From Caligula’s ‘Pleasure Boat’ Spent 45 Years as a Coffee Table in NYC
Authorities returned the ancient artwork, now on view at a museum near Rome, to Italy following a multi-year investigation

In 2013, Dario Del Bufalo, an Italian expert on ancient marble and stone, was signing copies of his book Porphyry in New York when he overheard a shocking conversation. Two people paging through the volume had spotted a photo of a Roman mosaic that disappeared toward the end of World War II. Suddenly, one of them exclaimed, “Oh, Helen, look, that’s your mosaic.”

Once part of the dance floor on one of Roman Emperor Caligula’s pleasure ships, the marble masterpiece was recovered from the depths of Lake Nemi in the 1930s, only to vanish the following decade. Art dealer Helen Fioratti and her husband, Nereo, purchased the mosaic from an aristocratic Italian family in the 1960s and used it as a coffee table in their Manhattan apartment for some 45 years. Now, reports Anderson Cooper for CBS News’ “60 Minutes,” the priceless artifact is back in Italy, where it recently went on display at the Museum of Roman Ships in Nemi.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 02:49 PM

Stilly you are a great sleuth.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 13 Jan 22 - 05:07 PM

I'll second that!!

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Jan 22 - 08:10 PM

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-antiquity/article/finding-archaeological-relevance-during-a-pandemic-and-what-c

Ethnocentric pandemics seem to be different overall than I was taught.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 14 Jan 22 - 09:27 PM

Error 494 - page not found - maybe the URL is too long?

I found it by searching for title - Finding Archaeological Relevance during a Pandemic and What - & it is indeed

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-antiquity/article/finding-archaeological-relevance-during-a-pandemic-and-what-comes-after/CB0492613EF4547C1191FBAC57C3F24B

here tis, using DaveRo's linkifier ... Recognizing that human populations most severely impacted by COVID-19 are typically descendants of marginalized groups, we investigate pre- and postcontact disease vectors among Indigenous and Black communities in North America, outlining the systemic impacts of diseases and the conditions that exacerbate their spread. We look at how material culture both reflects and changes as a result of social transformations brought about by disease, the insights that paleopathology provides about the ancient human condition, and the impacts of ancient globalization on the spread of disease worldwide. By understanding the differential effects of past epidemics on diverse communities and contributing to more equitable sociopolitical agendas, archaeology can play a key role in helping to pursue a more just future ...

Epidemic Disease among Indigenous Peoples, Black Communities, and Other Underrepresented Groups
Best-selling books such as Jared Diamond's Pulitzer Prize–winning Guns, Germs, and Steel (Reference Diamond1999) and Charles Mann's 1491 (Reference Mann2005) draw attention to the devastation of Indigenous communities due to epidemic diseases introduced through European colonialism ...

I just skimmed thru it, I don't have the concentration to read it at the moment.

DaveRo's linkifier

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Jan 22 - 07:10 AM

Sometimes there was an enormous delay between exposure and pandemic spread. Not what I expected after learning about Spaniard small pox and the Aztecs. My bet is that jet travel did not exist in ancient times :^/

Anyway it reminded me that Amazon indigenous tribes may be at risk in Brazil.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Jan 22 - 02:20 PM

Right now everyone seems to be "dying of Stupid," when a casual encounter with a contagious anti-vaxxer is spreading COVID like wildfire. Everyone of them is a little Colonel Henry Bouquet.

The archeological work that happens indoors (covered with awnings, etc.) may be on hold. Perhaps digs in the fresh air can continue.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 15 Jan 22 - 06:03 PM

for those who need a constant archaeology fix, you could bookmark these sites
UK's biggest railway project = biggest archaeology project
Ancient Origins
Smithsonian archaeology

Any other good sites I can add to my bookmarks?

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 02:41 AM

Archaeology’s sexual revolution Graves dating back thousands of years are giving up their secrets, as new ways to pin down the sex of old bones are overturning long-held, biased beliefs about gender and love
I Emilie Steinmark
Mon 17 Jan 2022 00.00 AEDT

Last modified on Mon 17 Jan 2022 06.13 AEDT

In the early summer of 2009, a team of archaeologists arrived at a construction site in a residential neighbourhood of Modena, Italy. Digging had started for a new building and in the process workers unearthed a cemetery, dating back 1,500 years. There were 11 graves, but it quickly became clear that one of them was not like the others. Instead of a single skeleton, Tomb 16 contained two and they were holding hands.

“Here’s the demonstration of how love between a man and a woman can really be eternal,” wrote Gazzetta di Modena of the pair, instantly dubbed “the Lovers”. However, according to the original anthropological report, the sex of the Lovers was not obvious from the bones alone. At some point, someone tried to analyse their DNA, but “the data were so bad”, says Federico Lugli at the University of Bologna, that it looked like “just random noise”. (read on)

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Rain Dog
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 05:43 AM

That was an interesting article Sandra, and a reminder, if one was needed, of the amount of guesswork that is involved when it comes to interpreting archaeological finds.

A few of the recent British finds have been covered in the latest series of the BBC TV programme Digging for Britain

Well worth a watch. It covers numerous digs that took place last year and before. It does remind us that even now so much remains buried in this country.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Rain Dog
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 05:56 AM

From the BBC

Crocodile found under Rhondda school floor

'A 120-year-old skeleton of a crocodile discovered under a school classroom has gone on display.

The bizarre find was made when builders lifted the floorboards of a Rhondda Cynon Taf school during renovation work.

Until then the story of a creature buried beneath Ysgol Bodringallt in Ystrad was long thought to be a myth.

Now the "legendary" saltwater crocodile has pride of place in the school after more than two years of restoration.

"I'd heard a story that parents and school staff had buried a crocodile under the school some time between the two world wars," head teacher Dr Neil Pike said at the time.

"But I thought it was a myth and didn't take any notice - until laid on the floor of the hall was the crocodile!"'

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 06:50 AM

wow! then I clicked on the link 'The mysterious medieval tunnel found by accident' & found another interesting article.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 09:15 AM

Beyond achaeology is paleotology. Today I learned of a pandemic virus that killed plankton leaving thier white micro skeletal behind.
That 'chalk' is what we call the white cliffs of Dover today which is a mass plankton graveyard. It used to go all the way across today's English channel but got washed away by geological forces in a flood of epic proportions. Eons ago some events are slow but some are quick
like the undersea volcano by Tonga this weekend.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 09:33 AM

edit: Missing are the n in paleontology and the word remains.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Rain Dog
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 12:03 PM

Thanks for mentioning that link Sandra.

A little searching led me to the following article on a site you might find of interest.

Mediaeval Mythbusting Blog #5: The Tintern Tunnels

I was amused to see a reference in the article to "the rumoured tunnel between Dover Castle and St Radegund’s Abbey". Even now locals talk of
a tunnel between the castle and the fortifications on the Western Heights. There are indeed a lot of tunnels and manmade caves under the castle and in other areas of the town. The chalk does lend itself to tunneling. During the 2nd World War the military expanded the facilities under the castle and a number of caves in the town were used as air raid shelters.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 17 Jan 22 - 04:57 PM

added to my bookmarks, thanks Rain Dog.

love these quotes - Scepticism of secret tunnels is not even a recent phenomenon. In 1913, whilst discussing the rumoured tunnel between Dover Castle and St Radegund’s Abbey, a writer for the Invicta Magazine for the Homes and People of Kent pulled no punches when they stated that ‘the cellars and drains of this old abbey provide food for those superstitious people who love underground passages to furnish with phantoms and ghosts and other disembodied creatures’ (Fielding 1913, 196-201).

A few years later S. E. Winbolt was a little more generous when he said that: ‘Underground passages are of course, always ‘intriguing’, and until the pick, shovel and the light of an electric lamp are brought to bear on them, extravagant legends persist… Drainage is the less romantic explanation of many of them’ (Winbolt 1935, 195).

Perhaps Jeremy Errand put this more poetically when he concluded that ‘a large proportion of stories of secret passages contain more moonshine than a fisherman’s boast’ (Errand 1974, 156).

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 22 Jan 22 - 03:57 AM

Excellently preserved, complete crossbow from 2,200 years ago found at Terracotta Warrior site ... Reported by news site China.org to be the most complete crossbow found to date at the site, it has a 145 centimeter (57 inch) arch and, incredibly, the bow string remains intact and measures 130 centimeters (51 inches) long. Researchers believe the string is made of animal tendon rather than fabric, which would have degraded and disappeared long ago.

Featured image: Bronze crossbow similar to one recently excavated from the terra cotta army pit at Xi’an, Shaanxi province. This weapon was from a war chariot excavated from the Tomb of The First Emperor, Lintong, Shaanxi Province Qin Dynasty, circa 210 B.C. Representational image only. Credit: Oberlin College of Arts & Sciences

The pic of the bow as found in the site is not quite as beautiful as the featured image, but it's even more interesting.

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 01 Feb 22 - 05:47 PM

Archaeologists uncover ancient helmets & temple ruins in southern Italy inds date to sixth-century BC Battle of Alalia, in which the Greeks defeated Etruscans and Carthaginians. Two ancient warrior helmets, metal fragments believed to have come from weapons, and the remains of a temple have been discovered at Velia, an archaeological site in southern Italy that was once a powerful Greek colony.
Experts believe the helmets, which were found in good condition, and metal fragments date to the sixth-century BC Battle of Alalia, when a Greek force of Phocaean ships clinched victory over the Etruscans and their Carthaginian allies in a naval battle off the coast of Corsica. One of the helmets is thought to have been taken from the enemies ...

photo of helmet
another photo of helmet

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: FreddyHeadey
Date: 08 Feb 22 - 10:40 AM

Remember before 8th February 2005 ??

Happy Birthday Google Maps

BBC World Service
Witness History
The invention of Google Maps

In 2005, a revolutionary online mapping service called Google Maps went live for the first time. It introduced searchable, scrollable, interactive maps to a wider public, but required so much computing power that Google's servers nearly collapsed under the strain.

Lars Rasmussen, one of the inventors of Google Maps, talks to Ashley Byrne.



https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/w3ct1x6n
9 minutes

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 12 Feb 22 - 01:07 AM

Ancient crocodile's last meal may have been a dinosaur Australian scientists say they've discovered a new species of crocodile, and its last meal may have been a dinosaur.

The crocodile, called a Broken Dinosaur Killer, was recovered on a sheep station in outback Queensland, and is believed to be more than 95 million years old.

Researchers say while piecing together the fossilised croc, they made a startling discovery — the partial remains of a young ornithopod dinosaur inside its stomach. (read on)

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 11:58 AM

I recently discovered a ancient dna controversy in European vs. American scientific strategies. Because of poor funding Americans are not dna testing the tarter from ancient teeth but Europe is.
Eoropean discoveries of ancient 'meals' has far out paced the US.
https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2021/03/ancient-tooth-tarter-provides-glimpse-into-early-trade-and-menu-items/

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 05:22 AM

good article, Donuel

Subject: RE: Armchair Archaeologist (via Google Earth)
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 04:16 PM

NIH did give ancient tarter research a small grant a couple years ago.