Archaeology

[RTH10260]

1,000-year-old Native American canoe retrieved from North Carolina lake
Elders moved to tears as members of tribe and archaeologists recover canoe discovered in Lake Waccamaw two years ago

Maya Yang
Fri 21 Apr 2023 18.24 BST

Tribal elders were moved to tears by the retrieval of a 1,000-year-old Native American canoe from Lake Waccamaw in North Carolina.

The Waccamaw Siouan chief, Michael Jacobs, told CBC it was emotional to watch the elders “sit on the bank and cry tears of joy, tears of sadness, tears of a future for our youth – how this is going to impact them and help them overcome some of the trauma they’ve experienced through being excluded at times, and even counted as not worthy”.

Members of the tribe, archaeologists and neighbors brought the canoe to the surface of the lake on Wednesday. It was discovered by a group of teenagers two years ago.

“This canoe is about 1,000 years old, and it’s a south-eastern Indian canoe, and it originated from this area … so we wanted the local Indian group to be part of it and share with the agency of it,” state archaeologist John Mintz told WECT.

The canoe was discovered in summer 2021 by three teenagers who went swimming in the 9,000-acre lake in Columbus county, in south-eastern North Carolina.

One of the teenagers, Eli Hill, stepped on the canoe, thinking it was a log.

“I tried to pick it up and it never came up,” he told WECT. “So we kept digging at it and it just kept going. And then the next day, we came back and we started digging some more and it just kept going.”

Hill’s family contacted state archaeologists, who sent a team to move the canoe closer to the family’s pier.

In a statement to WECT, Jacobs said that the canoe offered an opportunity to learn more about Native American history.

“That canoe at 28ft long would have carried many a brave,” he said, adding: “We feel like in our heart, it’s a history that we’re still exploring and understanding because this is the first time we’ve had access.”

Jacobs told CBC: “Our youth now can touch something that’s tangible. They can handle it … Our whole tribe is excited about this.

“When I saw that canoe, it was like a man that only heard about his mother, and now you finally get to meet her.”

The canoe will undergo preservation processes, in which its wood will be chemically treated.

On Saturday, it will be put on display at an open house event at Queen Anne’s Revenge Conservation Laboratory in Greenville, North Carolina.



https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... ican-canoe

[Liz]

1,000-year-old Native American canoe retrieved from North Carolina lake


https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/202 ... ican-canoe

It surely was wider... 1000 years is long time to be in the muck... but worse to be out of sometimes.

[Dave from down under]

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-04-28/ ... /102280588

A statue of Buddha has been discovered in Egypt's ancient seaport of Berenice on the Red Sea, shedding light on trade ties with India under the Roman empire.

Key points:

The 71cm statue was found missing part of its right side and its right leg
The find points to trade ties between Egypt and India during the Roman era
Berenice was often the destination for ships from India laden with trade goods
A Polish-US mission discovered the statue "dating back to the Roman era while digging at the ancient temple in Berenice", an antiquities ministry statement said on Wednesday.

The find has "important indications over the presence of trade ties between Egypt and India during the Roman era", head of Egypt's supreme antiquities council Mostafa al-Waziri said.

The statue, with part of its right side and its right leg missing, measures 71 centimetres in height and portrays Buddha with a halo around his head and a lotus flower by his side.

Mr Waziri said Berenice was one of the largest seaports in Roman-era Egypt, and was often the destination for ships from India laden with spices, semi-precious stones, textiles and ivory.

[RTH10260]

the Missing Link

Couple unearth one of world’s greatest fossil finds in mid-Wales
Discovery could help plug gaps in understanding of evolution after Cambrian explosion more than 500m years ago

Linda Geddes
Mon 1 May 2023 19.08 BST

Many people discovered new interests closer to home as a result of Covid-19 lockdowns. For Dr Joseph Botting and Dr Lucy Muir, it was a 10-metre-wide quarry in a sheep field near to their home in Llandrindod, central Wales, which appeared to be teeming with tiny fossils.

Now researchers believe the site could help plug gaps in scientific understanding of how evolution proceeded after the Cambrian explosion – the period when the ancestors of most modern animals are believed to have evolved. It could even prove to be as important as the Burgess Shale in Canada that preserves one of the world’s first complex marine ecosystems, experts say.

The Welsh site, known as Castle Bank, dates from the Middle Ordovician period, about 460m-70m years ago. It represents a community of diverse and mostly diminutive (1mm to 5mm in body length) marine organisms that existed at a time when ocean covered what is now mid-Wales.

Many of the 170-odd fossils discovered so far have preserved soft tissues such as digestive systems, eyes, optic nerves and brains, and include worms, starfish, sponges, crustaceans and extinct arthropods.

The site is important because it gives us a new window into how life was evolving at the time. The Cambrian explosion, which occurred between 540m and 485m years ago, was a period when many new and complex life forms arose. But by 400m years ago, almost all of these creatures had disappeared, eventually replaced by the ancestors of many modern animals. The Castle Bank fossils could help to bridge that gap, providing an insight into how life was evolving at a time when there was virtually no life on land, but animals and algae were thriving in the seas.

Muir said: “It coincides with the Great Ordovician Biodiversification event, when animals with hard skeletons were evolving rapidly. I like to refer to it as ‘when life got interesting’. It is when ecology diversified, as well as animals themselves.”

Although other Ordovician fossil sites exist, most are older and preserve only a limited fauna, with few entirely soft-bodied animals. “Here, it seems, we’ve got everything,” said Botting.




https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... -mid-wales

[RTH10260]

Eight-Year-Old Norwegian Girl Discovers Neolithic Dagger at School Playground
The 3,700-year-old tool is made of flint, a material that doesn’t occur naturally in the Scandinavian country

Christopher Parker Daily Correspondent
May 11, 2023

Eight-year-old Elise found the dagger tucked in a pile of stones in the school yard. Vestland County Municipality
For Elise, a student at Our Children’s School in Osøyro, Norway, a recent trip to the playground brought a special surprise—and international attention.

The 8-year-old girl was outside with her classmates when she bent down to pick up a stray shard of glass. Instead, she says in a statement, what appeared to be a small rock caught her eye. Realizing the item’s potential significance, Elise’s teacher, Karen Drange, notified the Vestland County Council of the discovery.

The almost five-inch-long object turned out to be a flint dagger dated to the Neolithic era, which began in the region around 2400 B.C.E., when humans started shifting from hunting and gathering to farming, according to the educational website Talk Norway. Live Science’s Laura Geggel notes that this specific type of dagger “is often found with sacrificial finds.”

Because flint isn’t a resource native to Norway, researchers suspect the roughly 3,700-year-old dagger originated elsewhere, perhaps in Denmark. An excavation of the school’s grounds following Elise’s discovery unearthed no related artifacts, strengthening the theory that the tool was brought to Norway after its creation.

In the statement, Louise Bjerre Petersen, an archaeologist who assessed the tool, calls it a beautiful, incredibly rare find. The dagger is now in the possession of experts at the University Museum of Bergen, who will study it for clues on life in Neolithic Norway.

Elise is far from the only schoolchild to happen upon an astonishing ancient artifact in the past few years. In July 2018, another 8-year-old girl, Saga Vanecek, uncovered an Iron Age sword in a Swedish lake, leading locals and news outlets alike to dub her the “Queen of Sweden” in reference to the Arthurian legend of the Sword in the Stone.

“I held it up in the air and I said, ‘Daddy, I found a sword!’” Vanecek told the Local’s Catherine Edwards. “When he saw that it bent and was rusty, he came running up and took it.”

More recently, in 2020, 6-year-old Imri Elya spotted a 3,500-year-old Canaanite tablet while hiking with his family in Israel, and 10-year-old Fiontann Hughes used a metal detector to unearth a centuries-old sword in Northern Ireland.

“I felt excited,” Hughes told BBC Newsline’s Cormac Campbell at the time, “because it was a sword and it was just here, and I didn’t really expect anything too big.”

Elise, for her part, was more succinct in describing her discovery, simply saying, “It was nice.”




https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-ne ... 180982163/

[RTH10260]

South China Sea shipwrecks give clues about historic Silk Road trade routes
Archaeologists begin excavation of two 500-year-old vessels filled with porcelain and timber

Helen Davidson in Taipei
Wed 24 May 2023 01.00 BST

Two 500-year-old shipwrecks in the South China Sea, filled with Ming-era porcelain and stacked timber, provide significant clues about the maritime Silk Road trade routes, Chinese archaeologists have said.

The two shipwrecks were discovered in October, and cultural and archaeological authorities have now begun a year-long process of deep-sea exploration and excavation, government officials announced.

Marine researchers found the two vessels in the north-west region of the South China Sea, about 1,500 metres below sea level. The officials said the wrecks were “relatively well preserved, with a large number of cultural relics”.

Experts said one of the wrecks dated back to the Ming dynasty’s Hongzhi period, which lasted from 1488 until 1505. It was carrying a cargo of stacked persimmon timber logs and some pottery.

The other wreck dates back to the Zhengde period of 1506 to 1521. The ship was laden with more than 100,000 pieces of porcelain crockery. Photographs show piles of stacked bowls, plates and jars, with intricate designs still visible underneath the sand and mud.

The archaeologists said the two ancient ships were travelling in different directions, and the wrecks were found less than 20km (12 miles) apart. They said it was the first time vessels returning and arriving had been found near each other, indicating they were travelling on an important trade route.




https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... ade-routes

[RTH10260]

‘Astonishing’ Roman tomb unearthed near London Bridge station
Some of the largest Roman mosaics found in 50 years were unearthed on same site last year

Caroline Davies
Tue 13 Jun 2023 12.41 BST

The remains of a Roman mausoleum “with an astonishing level of preservation” – believed to be the most intact structure of its kind discovered in Britain – have been unearthed in London.

The “incredibly rare” find has been excavated at the The Liberty of Southwark development site, a stone’s throw from Borough Market and London Bridge station, the Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA) has revealed.

The excavation of the tomb follows the discovery in February last year of some of the largest Roman mosaics found in London in more than 50 years on the same site. The find includes the walls and interior floors. At its centre is a striking mosaic surrounded by a raised platform on which the burials were placed. The lowest entrance steps also survive.

The level of preservation of the interior makes this the most intact Roman mausoleum ever to be discovered in Britain, according to MOLA, which led the archeological investigations on behalf of Landsec and Transport for London (TfL) which own the site, and Southwark council.

There are plans for the future public display of the mausoleum, which underwent significant modifications. A second mosaic directly beneath the first indicates it was raised during its lifetime. The two mosaics are similar, with a central flower surrounded by concentric circles.

Although the tomb was almost completely dismantled, probably during the medieval period, the signs are it was a substantial building, perhaps two storeys high, and would have been used by wealthier Romans, possibly as a family tomb.

Though no coffins or burial remains were found, more than 100 coins, together with scrap pieces of metal, fragments of pottery and some roofing tiles were discovered. The area surrounding the mausoleum contained more than 80 Roman burials, including copper bracelets, glass beads, coins, pottery and even a bone comb.




https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/202 ... ge-station

[RTH10260]

Germany

pls check article for images

‘Almost still shines’: 3,000-year-old sword unearthed in Germany
Object from mid-bronze age, in ‘extraordinary’ state of preservation, was found in grave in Bavaria

AP in Berlin
Fri 16 Jun 2023 18.38 BST

A bronze sword more than 3,000 years old , which is so well-preserved that it “almost still shines”, has been unearthed in southern Germany, officials say.

The Bavarian state office for the preservation of historical monuments (BLfD) said the sword, which is believed to date back to the end of the 14th century BC — the middle of the bronze age — was found during excavations last week in Nördlingen, between Nuremberg and Stuttgart.

The sword has an octagonal hilt and comes from a grave in which three people – a man, a woman and a boy – were buried in quick succession with bronze objects, the BLfD said this week. It was not yet clear whether the three were related to each other and, if so, how.

Prof Mathias Pfeil, the head of the BLfD, said: “The sword and the burial still need to be examined so that our archeologists can categorise this find more precisely. But we can already say that the state of preservation is extraordinary. A find like this is very rare.”

It is unusual to find swords from the period, but they have emerged from burial mounds that were opened in the 19th century or as individual finds, the BLfD said.



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... ve-bavaria

[Liz]

Germany

pls check article for images

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... ve-bavaria

The image... way nicer than I thought...

[Dave from down under]

[RTH10260]

when Russia had to depend on the West --- WW2

Second world war British fighter planes unearthed in Ukraine
Remains of eight Hurricanes dating back to 1940s conflict found south of Kyiv

Lorenzo Tondo in Kyiv
Sun 2 Jul 2023 12.41 BST

Authorities in Ukraine have discovered the remains of eight British Hurricane fighter planes dating back to the second world war.

The aircraft, found near an unexploded bomb dating from the same conflict in a forest south of Kyiv, were sent to the Soviet Union by Britain after Nazi Germany invaded the country in 1941.

“It is very rare to find this aircraft in Ukraine,” Oleks Shtan, a former airline pilot who is leading the excavation, told the BBC. “It’s very important for our aviation history because no lend-lease aircraft have been found here before.”

The Hurricanes, which shot down more than half of all German aircraft during the Battle of Britain, were part of a package of about 3,000 fighter planes delivered to the USSR between 1941 and 1944 to support the Soviet war effort.

“The Hurricane was a strong, easy to fly machine,” Shtan says. “It was stable as a gun platform and suitable for inexperienced pilots. A reliable aircraft.”

The rusting remains of the aircraft had been stripped of their most valuable components, including radios and machine guns, and dragged to the woodland.

According to historians, some of these aircraft were deliberately broken up and buried after the war so the Soviets did not have to pay back the US, as under lend-lease legislation Moscow was required to pay for any donated military equipment that remained intact.

Ukraine’s National Aviation Museum is aiming to reassemble the Hurricanes and put them on display.



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... in-ukraine

[RTH10260]

800-year-old sword was found in Mediterranean Sea. Now experts know how it got there

Moira Ritter
Tue, July 25, 2023 at 1:00 PM GMT+2

In the midst of a raging naval battle, a more than 3-foot-long sword was flung overboard. It settled in the sandy floor of the Mediterranean Sea — and that’s where it stayed for at least 800 years until it was discovered by divers in 2021.

Or at least that’s the narrative experts with the Israel Antiquities Authority have decided on, according to a July 23 Facebook post.

Over the past several centuries, the iron sword developed a crust of sand and shells, preventing experts from examining the metal itself without damaging the weapon, the post said. Instead, researchers used X-rays and radiography technology to penetrate the thick layers of marine concretion and get a view of the original sword.

“It is unfortunate that we can’t see the sword as it was,” researchers said, according to the Facebook post. “On the other hand, the concretion is responsible for slowing down the oxidation process, preserving the sword in its entirety. Otherwise, the iron would have rusted and disintegrated in the water.”

The X-ray findings were published in the July 2023 edition of the Israel Antiquities Authority’s journal, ‘Atiqot. Here’s what to know about the latest findings:




https://www.yahoo.com/news/800-old-swor ... 00175.html
(original: Miami Herald)

[RTH10260]

UK

Rare stamp that offered fast track to heaven to go on display in UK
Stamp for papers that enabled ‘fast-track’ through purgatory will be on show at a Hampshire priory

Harriet Sherwood Arts and culture correspondent
Fri 28 Jul 2023 05.00 BST

A seal matrix used to authenticate medieval indulgences and offer a fast track to heaven in exchange for cash is to go on display at a Hampshire priory after spending 500 years buried in a field.

The small carved mould, dating between 1470 and 1520, was found by a metal detectorist two miles from Mottisfont, an Augustinian priory and site of pilgrimage near Romsey, Hampshire, that is now owned by the National Trust.

Indulgences were written pardons for sinful behaviour granted by religious institutions in return for financial donation.

They lessened the purchaser’s time in purgatory after death by one year and 40 days.

The documents were certified with an impression created by the seal matrix pressed into hot coloured wax.

Mottisfont, founded in 1201, had been a wealthy institution but its income was depleted as a result of the Black Death plague that swept through Europe in the 1340s. The pope granted the priory permission to sell indulgences to raise funds.

The practice of selling pardons later became embroiled in accusations of corruption that helped fuel the Protestant Reformation. Mottisfont closed as a priory with the dissolution of the monasteries in 1536.

The rare seal matrix, made of cast copper-alloy, is inscribed in Latin and features a carved depiction of the Trinity and a figure of a praying cleric.

It was discovered at the site of medieval market in the nearby parish of Lockerley, possibly taken there by a canon hoping to sell indulgences.

The detectorist reported the find to their local council, and it was added to a national database and flagged to the National Trust.

George Roberts, curator at the National Trust, said: “Pilgrims travelling between the great cathedrals at Salisbury and Winchester are likely to have passed Mottisfont and may well have stayed and worshipped with the community there.




https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... play-in-uk

[Slim Cognito]

Kewl.

[MsDaisy 2]

300,000-year-old skull found in China unlike any early human seen before

An ancient skull dating back 300,000 years is unlike any other premodern human fossil ever found, potentially pointing to a new branch in the human family tree, according to new research.

An international team of researchers from China, Spain and the United Kingdom unearthed the skull — specifically the mandible, or lower jaw — in the Hualongdong region of eastern China in 2015, along with 15 other specimens, all thought to originate from the late Middle Pleistocene period.

Scientists believe the late Middle Pleistocene, which started around 300,000 years ago, was a pivotal period for the evolution of hominins — species that are regarded as human or closely related — including modern humans.

Published in the Journal of Human Evolution on July 31, a study by the research team found that the mandible, known as HLD 6, is “unexpected” and does not fit into any existing taxonomic groups.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/10/asia/anc ... index.html

[RTH10260]

insights into the discoveries of Egyptian tombs in 2010 / 2020 and excavation

story like presentation for tv viewers

[RTH10260]

did not look yet for original news reports from 2020

[RTH10260]

as above

'Sistine Chapel of the ancients' rock art discovered in remote Amazon forest
Tens of thousands of ice age paintings across a cliff face shed light on people and animals from 12,500 years ago

Dalya Alberge
Sun 29 Nov 2020 10.00 GMT

One of the world’s largest collections of prehistoric rock art has been discovered in the Amazonian rainforest.

Hailed as “the Sistine Chapel of the ancients”, archaeologists have found tens of thousands of paintings of animals and humans created up to 12,500 years ago across cliff faces that stretch across nearly eight miles in Colombia.

Their date is based partly on their depictions of now-extinct ice age animals, such as the mastodon, a prehistoric relative of the elephant that hasn’t roamed South America for at least 12,000 years. There are also images of the palaeolama, an extinct camelid, as well as giant sloths and ice age horses.

These animals were all seen and painted by some of the very first humans ever to reach the Amazon. Their pictures give a glimpse into a lost, ancient civilisation. Such is the sheer scale of paintings that they will take generations to study.

The discovery was made last year, but has been kept secret until now as it was filmed for a major Channel 4 series to be screened in December: Jungle Mystery: Lost Kingdoms of the Amazon.

The site is in the Serranía de la Lindosa where, along with the Chiribiquete national park, other rock art had been found. The documentary’s presenter, Ella Al-Shamahi, an archaeologist and explorer, told the Observer: “The new site is so new, they haven’t even given it a name yet.”



https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... zon-forest

[RTH10260]

Ice Age megafauna rock art in the Colombian Amazon?

José Iriarte, Michael J. Ziegler, Alan K. Outram, Mark Robinson, Patrick Roberts, Francisco J. Aceituno, Gaspar Morcote-Ríos and T. Michael Keesey
Published:07 March 2022

Abstract

Megafauna paintings have accompanied the earliest archaeological contexts across the continents, revealing a fundamental inter-relationship between early humans and megafauna during the global human expansion as unfamiliar landscapes were humanized and identities built into new territories. However, the identification of extinct megafauna from rock art is controversial. Here, we examine potential megafauna depictions in the rock art of Serranía de la Lindosa, Colombian Amazon, that includes a giant sloth, a gomphothere, a camelid, horses and three-toed ungulates with trunks. We argue that they are Ice Age rock art based on the (i) naturalistic appearance and diagnostic morphological features of the animal images, (ii) late Pleistocene archaeological dates from La Lindosa confirming the contemporaneity of humans and megafauna, (iii) recovery of ochre pigments in late Pleistocene archaeological strata, (iv) the presence of most megafauna identified in the region during the late Pleistocene as attested by archaeological and palaeontological records, and (v) widespread depiction of extinct megafauna in rock art across the Americas. Our findings contribute to the emerging picture of considerable geographical and stylistic variation of geometric and figurative rock art from early human occupations across South America. Lastly, we discuss the implications of our findings for understanding the early human history of tropical South America.

This article is part of the theme issue ‘Tropical forests in the deep human past’.



cont. at https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/ ... .2020.0496

[Foggy]

Looks like you can get that documentary, Jungle Mystery: Lost Kingdoms of the Amazon, from Channel 4. I just googed the name, I'm not gonna sign up today.

Oh, oops. It says "No episode available to watch on demand". I guess you can't rent it.

[RTH10260]

new to me, likely to you too also

[Suranis]

https://www.facebook.com/GeomorphologyR ... %2CO%2CP-R

*Breaking News* --Today, Nature Scientific Reports has RETRACTED the ARTICLE originally published on 01 February 2022 titled "The Hopewell airburst event, 1699–1567 years ago (252–383 CE)" by Tankersley et al.. The Tankersley paper claimed that a cosmic event caused demise of the Hopewell people.

This decision was in response to the 'Matters Arising' article published by Nolan et al on 09 August 2023, titled "Refuting the sensational claim of a Hopewell-ending cosmic airburst," which you can read, here: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-023-39866-0

IMHO -- This is a huge positive development, because too much poor work is published in the field of geoarchaeology --it is almost impossible to argue against pseudoscience once it gains public attention. A HEARTY congratulations to the interdisciplinary team that worked hard and with great persistence to get their ideas published as a 'Matters Arising' response in Nature Scientific Reports: Kevin C. Nolan, Andrew Weiland, Bradley T. Lepper, Jennifer Aultman, Laura R. Murphy, Bret J. Ruby, Kevin Schwarz, Matthew Davidson, DeeAnne Wymer, Timothy D. Everhart, Anthony M. Krus & Timothy J. McCoy

--dr k. Attention @RetractionWatch

[RTH10260]

Metal detectorist makes Norway’s ‘gold find of century’
Erlend Bore, who was out walking on doctor’s orders, finds cache including rare medallions from about AD500

Staff and agencies in Oslo
Thu 7 Sep 2023 16.21 BST

A Norwegian man out walking on doctors’ advice unearthed rare sixth-century gold jewellery using a newly bought metal detector, in a discovery archaeologists have hailed as Norway’s “gold find of the century”.

The cache comprised nine gold medallions and gold pearls that once formed an opulent necklace, as well as three gold rings. The jewels, which weigh a little more than 100g, were found to date from about AD500.

“At first I thought it was chocolate coins or Captain Sabertooth coins,” said Erlend Bore, 51, referring to a fictional Norwegian pirate. “It was totally unreal.”

Archaeologists say the find is unique because of the design on the medallions: a type of horse from Norse mythology.

Bore, who dreamed of becoming an archaeologist as a child, made the discovery on the southern island of Rennesøy, near Stavanger, in August after he bought a metal detector on his doctors’ recommendation to get more exercise.

He had been out searching and was about to head home for the day when the device suddenly began beeping on a hillside.

He called archaeologists, who took over the search.

Ole Madsen, head of the University of Stavanger’s Museum of Archaeology, said it was “the gold find of the century in Norway. To find that much gold all at once is extremely unusual.”

Håkon Reiersen, an associate professor at the museum, said the gold pendants – flat, thin, single-sided gold medals called bracteates – dated from the so-called migration period in Norway, which ran between AD400 and about AD550, when there were widespread migrations in Europe.

“Given the location of the discovery and what we know from other similar finds, this is probably a matter of either hidden valuables or an offering to the gods during dramatic times,” he said.

The pendants and gold pearls were part of “a very showy necklace” made by skilled jewellers and worn by society’s most powerful, said Reiersen. He added that “in Norway, no similar discovery has been made since the 19th century, and it is also a very unusual discovery in a Scandinavian context”.



https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/ ... medallions

[RTH10260]

this happened earlier this summer

Emperor Nero’s lost theatre found under site of hotel in Rome
Archaeologists hail ‘exceptional finds’ at venue whose existence was previously known only from mentions in ancient texts

Associated Press in Rome
Thu 27 Jul 2023 17.01 BST

The ruins of Nero’s Theatre, an imperial theatre referred to in ancient Roman texts but never found, have been discovered under the garden of a future Four Seasons hotel, steps away from the Vatican.

Archaeologists in Rome have excavated deep under the walled garden of the Palazzo della Rovere since 2020 as part of planned renovations on the frescoed Renaissance building. The palazzo, which takes up a city block along the broad Via della Conciliazione leading to Saint Peter’s Square, is home to an ancient Vatican chivalric order that leases the space to a hotel to raise money for Christians in the Holy Land.

The governor general of the Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, Leonardo Visconti di Modrone, confirmed during a news conference announcing the discovery that the hotel chain due to occupy the site was the Four Seasons. News reports have said the hotel is expected to be open in time for the Vatican’s 2025 jubilee, when an estimated 30 million visitors and pilgrims are expected to visit Rome.



https://www.theguardian.com/science/202 ... el-in-rome

[RTH10260]

Sterngard would have already known more than Pythagoras

Evidence ancient Babylonians were far more advanced than we thought - BBC REEL

BBC Reel
2021 6 Dec

Plimpton 322 is the name given to a 3,800-year-old clay tablet discovered in Iraq in the early 20th Century by archeologist Edgar J Banks, the man believed to have inspired Indiana Jones. Over time this tablet has become one of the most significant and most studied objects of the ancient world.

Dr Daniel Mansfield, of the University of New South Wales, who has studied Plimpton 322 along with other similar tablets, argues that these are evidence that the Babylonians were solving real-world problems, such as surveying, using the basics of Pythagoras' theorem 1,000 years before the ancient Greeks.

Produced by Lucas Mullikin