No Christmas would be the same without many a wasted hour spent buried in the couch – wiped-out on a bellyful of turkey and stuffing, or nursing a hangover after a Herculean night’s mulled wine consumption – flicking the channels in a dozy haze. It's a Christmas tradition (although we can't guarentee that it dates back as far as some other ancient seasonal rituals)
This year you can spare yourself all those awful festive films and Christmas music videos you’ve seen a million times, by keeping Heritage Key’s handy guide to ancient world-themed Christmas TV close at hand.
All the old-school three-hours plus historical epics are being dusted down again for the season of good will – among them many of the biggest ancient world blockbusters of all time – as well as a raft of comedy and family-orientated ancient world-related movies, and even a few interesting-sounding documentaries.
The roots of archaeology – “the study of human history and prehistory through the excavation of sites and the analysis of physical remains,” to quote the Oxford English Dictionary – can be traced back in their most basic form as late as the age of the last emperor of Babylon, Nabonidus, in the 6th century BC, and perhaps even further, to the ancient Egyptians.
In the thousands of years that have passed since, the discipline has become a highly professionalised pursuit, with a broad and firmly-established range of techniques and practices, a complex theoretical framework and a strong ethical code. But it hasn’t taken a direct route to get there.
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Jefferson's excavation saw him over-generously referred to by some as the “father of archaeology” – he was probably inspired to undertake his study after a visit to Europe.
Submitted by Sean Williams on Tue, 11/17/2009 - 18:46
Experts working at an ancient Inca archaeological site claim three skulls discovered in a ceremonial vessel prove the civilisation cut off the heads of their enemies. The skulls were found by a Peruvian team digging at the ancient ceremonial centre of Qowicarana Ridge, just north of Cuzco. Now the team hopes to find the remains of the trio's bodies, to prove whether they were actually decapitated - either during or after battle.
Washington Camacho, director of Sacsayhuaman Archaeological Park, says the heads most likely belong to rival chiefs (curacas) or religious leaders of enemy tribes. The heads would have been taken as trophies of war, and offered to the gods. Camacho says the ritual offering of heads occurred during the mysterious culture's final throes, around 1500 AD, under the rule of Huayna Capac.
For Richard Burger, archaeology has turned up many surprising things. This includes romance, which blossomed when he met his archaeologist wife, Lucy Salazar, at a dig in her native Peru. “Sites are not all that romantic. There’s too much work!” says Burger. Luckily, however, nearby Lima was in the full flood of a Southern Hemisphere Spring, and love found its way out of the dusty remains after all.
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At the top, decorating the entrance to a central chamber, is a frieze depicting a giant mouth with three-foot long fangs.
Submitted by Sean Williams on Tue, 11/10/2009 - 13:06
The mummy of a young Nazca priestess has been discovered in the ancient city of Cahuachi, Peru. Italian archaeologist Giuseppe Orefici, director of the Nazca Project, made the startling find in a mini-temple between the mysterious metropolis' Great and Orange Pyramids.
The 300-450 AD woman had been buried beneath ropes and reeds, and covered in finely-woven fabrics with killer whale pattern. Several obsidian arrow heads had also been worked into the weave.
The southern Peruvian heritage site of Cahuachi was once the cultural and religious capital of the ancient Nazca tribe, who flourished between 500 BC and 500 AD. The city itself comprises around 40 adobe mounds and structures, and covers a huge area - some believe it stretches up to 24km² along dusty hills overlooking the Nazca River Valley. It is widely thought to have only held a small permanent population, serving instead as a place of pilgrimage, where the elite and religiously important would stay to cater for huge ceremonies. Several mummies have been unearthed in the region, alongside a myriad stunning treasures.
Cahuachi's most famous monument is the Great Pyramid, which hogs the skyline and casts an eye over the Nazca Lines, the geoglyphs which have made the culture so famous. As with most buildings in the city, the pyramid looks like a giant maze thanks to the winding ceremonial staircases which lead to its summit. Other notable landmarks include the Orange Pyramid and the Stepped Temple (Templo del Escalonado) at the foot of the Great Pyramid, so-named because its walls are lined with chakanas, or Andean Crosses, which look like stairways.
Dr John Hemming is a British-raised Canadian explorer and author, specialising in the study of the indigenous peoples of Amazonia - particularly Brazilian indians - as well as the ancient Incas and Peruvian archaeology. He has written and contributed to over 120 publications, and won multiple awards for his work over the years.
Born in Vancouver, Hemming was educated in the United Kingdom at Eton College and read History at Magdalen College, Oxford. One of his first expeditions to South America in 1961 - as part of a team sent to investigate the unexplored Iriri River country in central Brazil - ended in disaster, when the party was ambushed by indians, and Hemming's friend and fellow Oxford graduate Richard Mason became the last Englishman ever to be killed by an uncontacted tribe.
It only led to a heightened interest in Brazilian tribes for Hemming, however, and he mounted multiple repeat expeditions to the region, encountering and interacting with many long-lost tribes, and penning - over a 26 year period - a three-volume history of the indigenous peoples of Amazonia: Red Gold in 1978, Amazon Frontier in 1985 and Die If You Must in 2004.
No Christmas would be the same without many a wasted hour spent buried in the couch – wiped-out on a bellyful of turkey and stuffing, or nursing a hangover after a Herculean night’s mulled wine consumption – flicking the channels in a dozy haze. It's a Christmas tradition (although we can't guarentee that it dates back as far as some other 
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