• Ann

    Tutankhamun visits Manchester, brings Tomb and Treasures

    King Tut’s treasures are returning to the UK, as ‘Tutankhamun His Tomb and His Treasures’ opened this weekend at Manchester’s Museum of Museums. Over 1,000 faithful replicas offer visitors the opportunity to look through Howard Carter’s eyes and experience the greatest discovery of all time for themselves. The entire world is familiar with ancient Egypt’s ‘piece de resistance’, the symbol of Egyptology King Tut’s golden death mask (slideshow). Yet, fewer people know that when Carter and Carnarvon discovered the pharaoh’s final resting place in 1922, it contained so many treasures that it was almost impossible to enter. It would take…

  • publication

    Legions of Rome: The Definitive History of Every Roman Legion

    Legions of Rome The Definitive History of Every Roman Legion by Stephen Dando-Collins No book on Roman history has attempted to do what Stephen Dando-Collins does in Legions of Rome: to provide a complete history of every Imperial Roman legion and what it achieved as a fighting force. The author has spent the last thirty years collecting every scrap of available evidence from numerous sources: stone and bronze inscriptions, coins, papyrus and literary accounts in a remarkable feat of historical detective work. The book is divided into three parts: Part 1 provides a detailed account of what the legionaries wore…

  • Ann

    5000 Years of History at Zurich Rescue Excavations: Stone Age Wooden Door (and more)

    Rescue excavations at the construction site of an underground car park in the Swiss city of Zurich are exceeding all expectations. So far, the remains of at least five successive prehistoricsettlements came to light, as well as some amazing finds. These including a flint dagger from Italy anda 5000-year-old wooden door – looking incredibly good for its age. The oldest of the settlements discovered at the Opera House digis dated to as early as 3700 BC. Underneath these remains, the archaeologists from Zurich’s Structural Engineering Department found sediment layers, which will offer information about the fluctuating water levels of Lake…

  • Ann

    York’s ‘Headless Romans’ (gladiators, according to some) had exotic origins and diet

    In 2004, agroup of 80 individuals were discovered at Driffield Terrace, in York. They were buried between the late 1st and early 4th centuries AD, on a large cemetery on the outskirts of Eboracum, the Roman town of York. They are unusual because they are all believed to be male,most are adults and more than half had been decapitated. When these 30 bodies were buried some got their heads in the right place on their shoulders. Others saw their heads placed between their knees, on their chests or down by their feet. In one double burial the two bodies even…

  • Ann

    York’s ‘Headless Romans’ (gladiators, according to some) had exotic origins and diet

    In 2004, a group of 80 individuals were discovered at Driffield Terrace, in York. They were buried between the late 1st and early 4th centuries AD, on a large cemetery on the outskirts of Eboracum, the Roman town of York.They are unusual because they are all believed to be male, most are adults – and more than half had been decapitated. When these 30 bodies were buried some got their heads in the right place – on their shoulders. Others saw their heads placed between their knees, on their chests or down by their feet. In one double burial the two bodies even had…

  • Ann

    Restoration of the Royal Palace and Excavations at Ancient Qatna, Syria

    After more than ten years of excavation and restoration, the ancient well-house at the Royal Palace of Qatna, Syria, has been officially opened to the public. It is the first phase of an ambitious project that will see the entire palace site opened for international tourism. The ancient city of Qatna is located at Mishrifeh in western Syria, about 18 km north-east of the city of Homs and 200km from the modern-day Syrian capital Damascus. Bronze Age Qatna was strategically located at a the now vanished lake of Mishrifeh. In the 2nd millennium BC, itbecame the capital city of the…

  • Ann

    Amazonian Dark Earth points to large amount of pre-Columbian settlements in North Brazil

    The pre-Columbian Indian societies that once lived in the Amazon rainforests may have been much larger than researchers previously realized. Archaeologists have located the remains of about 90 settlements in an area south of the city of Santarm, Brazil. Traditionally archaeologists have thought that these inland areas in northern Brazil were sparsely populated before the arrival of the Europeans in the 16th and 17th centuries. One reason for this assumption is that the soil found in the Santarm area is generally quite infertile; another reason is that far away from all the major watercourses, the access to water in the…

  • Ann

    Tomb of ancient Egyptian priest Rudj-Ka discovered at Giza

    Egyptian archaeologists discovered a 4400-year-old tomb, south of the cemetery of the pyramid builders at Giza, Egypt. In a statement, Egyptian Minister of Culture Farouk Hosny, said the ancient Egyptian tomb was unearthed during routine excavations supervised by the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) near the pyramid builder’s necropolis. The recently discovered tomb belongs to a priest named Rudj-Ka (or Rwd-Ka), and is dated to the 5th Dynasty – between 2465 and 2323 BC. Dr. Zahi Hawass, Secretary General of the SCA, said that Rudj-Ka had several titles and would have been an important member of the ancient Egyptian court. Rudj-Ka was…

  • Ann

    Hoard of 10,000 Roman Coins found in Shropshire

    A massive haul of more than 10,000 Roman coins crammed inside a buried clay pot has been unearthed by an amateur metal detecting enthusiast – on his first ever treasure hunt, and this only a few days after it was announced the Vale of York Hoard was purchased by the British Museum. The silver and bronze ‘nummi’ coins, dating from between 240 AD and 320 AD, were discovered in a farmer’s field near Shrewsbury, in Shropshire, last month. Experts say the coins have spent an estimated 1,700 years underground. The stunning collection of coins, most of which were found inside the…

  • Ann

    Excavations start at unique 5,000-year-old Tirnony Dolmen

    Archaeologists from the Northern Ireland Environment started excavating the 5,000-year-old Tirnony portal tomb near Maghera – an extraordinary ‘archaeological treat’ – and the public is invited to drop by, with an ‘open dig’ every Friday. Quick update: Neolithic knife find hints at undisturbed burial The Tirnony Portal Tomb, also known as the Tirnony Dolmen, is a single-chamber megalithic tomb, estimated to be about 5,000 to 6,000 years old.  The capstone is – or rather, was – supported by three of six upright stones, two of which form the portal. In April this year, the burial tomb’s massive capstone fell off, severely damaging one…