Sri Lanka's pre-historic human to be sent to Germany for testing

From Colombo Page: Sri Lanka's pre-historic human to be sent to Germany for testing


July 07, Colombo: Sri Lanka's pre-historic human skeleton found recently from an archeological site in Kalutara district of Western Province will be sent to Germany for further studies, Archeology Department officials have said.

Samples of the skeleton found in the Fa-Hien cave archaeological site in Pahiyangala of Kalutara district have been collected for DNA studies and the skeletal parts and DNA samples will be sent to Germany for further research, the officials said.

A team of Sri Lankan archeologists and an archeology expert, Dr. Jay Stock from the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Cambridge has collected the samples of the skeleton at the site.

The excavated skeleton is to be kept frozen to preserve it from the environment the Director General of Archaeology, Dr. Senarath Dissanayake has said.

The skeleton is believed to be about 37,000 years old and belonged to the Homo sapiens species known as Balangoda Man. Along with the skeleton, stone tools and glass bead jewelry have been found in the cave. According to the scientists this is the first complete human skeleton found in South Asia.
 

Metro, Archeological Survey of India spar over ‘Mughal’ find

From the Times of India:  Metro, Archeological Survey of India spar over ‘Mughal’ find

NEW DELHI: The controversy regarding the discovery of Mughal-era relics near Jama Masjid Metro Station seems to have turned into a turf war between Delhi Metro and Archeological Survey of India (ASI). While the latter has recommended a further investigation of the site, DMRC is playing down the heritage tag of the findings.

Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) sources say that till the discovered structure is listed as a heritage monument, Metro will not stop work at the site.

"The location of the station box has already been changed once as the ASI felt it was too close to Sunehri Masjid. Since it is yet to be determined whether the Akbarabadi mosque was located at the site in question, Delhi Metro will continue with construction work till we are advised to do otherwise," a spokesperson for the agency said. The site is part of the original station box location.

The new station is located 30-odd metre away from the previous location. Earlier, the Jama Masjid Metro Station was 103m away from Sunehri Masjid and 300m from Jama Masjid. Now, it is located at a distance of 130m from Sunehri Masjid and 200m from Jama Masjid. "Preliminary work is already underway. Digging for surveys, and soil and water table testing up to 18-20m is going on. Piling will start soon," added the official.
Meanwhile, ASI officials said the site has "huge potential for excavations that could unearth new archaeological discoveries". The ASI team that visited the site last week and confirmed that the findings were from the Mughal-era, has submitted a report to director-general Gautam Sengupta, said sources. ASI is still unclear whether the relics belong to the Akbarabadi mosque.

"Even before the ruins were found, we had served a notice to Delhi Metro asking them to stop work in that area as it falls in the regulated zone of Sunehri Masjid. This prompted them to change the alignment of the station. Till we complete investigation into the recent findings, Metro has been asked to halt construction work," said an ASI official.

National Monuments Authority (NMA) member-secretary Praveen Srivastava said irrespective of any archaeological findings, DMRC still is not allowed to carry out construction work within 300m of protected monuments like Sunehri Masjid without getting an NOC. "DMRC's request is still pending with NMA," Srivastava said.

Conservationists say that ideally DMRC should integrate the findings with the Metro station. "The design of the station has to be altered and a new strategy needs to be adopted. The process will take much longer but the archeological remains can be integrated with the station. Many countries have done this," said an archaeologist.

Experts say that ASI has the power under the Ancient Monuments and Archaeological Sites and Remains (Amendment and Validation) Act, 2010 to take over any site which has confirmed evidence of historical remains. Further action will be initiated by ASI only after studying the recommendations of the Delhi circle team, added officials.

Officials said that as the matter had already been brought to chief minister Sheila Dikshit's notice, there was a strong possibility that the area could be taken over by the department of archeology under the Delhi government.

MASS: DHPT to host talk on archeology at Southworth Library on July 25

From SouthCoastToday:  DHPT to host talk on archeology at Southworth Library on July 25

DARTMOUTH — Join the Dartmouth Heritage Preservation Trust, Inc. (DHPT) as the organization commemorates the 250th anniversary of the 1762 Akin House this summer.

As a special treat for archaeology buffs, DHPT is pleased to announce that the Massachusetts Archaeological Society (MAS) of Middleborough will be participating in celebratory activities honoring the Akin House's birth, some 14 years before the Declaration of Independence.

In the first in a series of public events planned during July, August and September, DHPT will present a lecture by MAS featuring the pre-contact and contact periods of Titicut — as the Native Americans called "the place of a great river" — in the northwest portion of Middleborough.

The talk, "A Review of Archaeological Finds in the Titicut Area of the Taunton River" will be presented by William B. Taylor, assisted by Frederick A. Robinson, Jr., from 6 to 8 p.m. on Wednesday, July 25 from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Southworth Library, 732 Dartmouth Street, Dartmouth.

Mr. Taylor has served on the board of trustees for the MAS and the Robbins Museum of Archaeology for many years. A graduate of Northeastern University, Taylor has collected and studied artifacts from the Titicut area, which encompasses the towns of Bridgewater, North Middleboro, and Raynham for 65 years. He has written many articles over the years for the MAS.

Mr. Robinson is vice-president of the MAS and an avocational archaeologist.

The public is encouraged to bring in artifacts from their own personal collections for review by the MAS. The suggested donation $5.00.

For more information, contact DHPT president Diane Gilbert by calling (508) 965-7265 or e-mailing d.m.gilbert@comcast.net.

 

Archeologists find water canal exits of Persepolis

From Vestnik Kavkaza :  Archeologists find water canal exits of Persepolis

“The team found a canal below the south wing which was built during the Achaemenid era to lead water out of Persepolis,” head of the archeology team Ali Asadi told CHTN. 

The soil which was dug up during Persepolis excavations over previous decades was piled up in the south wing, making it difficult for archeologists to notice water canal exits, Asadi added. 

Previous phases of the surface water drainage project of Persepolis unveiled 20 meters of unknown water canals and 1,000 bas-reliefs mostly belonging to the columns of the Hundred-Columns Palace, which was once the largest monument in the complex. 

Once known as the richest city under the sun, Persepolis was the ceremonial capital of this Persian Empire, which was the greatest power of the ancient world. 

 

Possible 20th-century boiler room discovered

From State News: Possible 20th-century boiler room discovered

Tuesday morning, Campus Archeologist and graduate student Katy Meyers shoveled the West Circle construction site, searching for clues about a discovered wall belonging to a structure lost in time.

A week earlier, MSU Physical Plant Geographic Information Systems analyst Nick Voss found a wall below the ground next to Morrill Hall, and archeologists were called to check the scene.

Archeologists realized it’s likely a portion of a boiler room built in 1900 to support Morrill Hall people forgot existed.

The building was not noted on the MSU Physical Plant’s construction maps, and the remains of the structure were a surprise to the construction team, MSU Physical Plant construction representative Andy Linebaugh said.

Since its discovery, archeologists have spent about 10 to 12 hours at the site digging up the remains of the building in search of clues about the structure’s use and the building’s purpose.

“We’re going to try and see if we can find a builder’s trench or … find a clue,” Lynne Goldstein, anthropology professor and director of MSU Campus Archaeology Program, said. “What we’re trying to figure out is which way the wall goes.”

Goldstein found a photo of a boiler room structure located in the same spot the wall was discovered.

After doing research, she is unsure how long the boiler room was used.

So far, only one wall has been dug up by MSU Campus Archeology Program. 

On Tuesday, Meyers also uncovered another structure, possibly a road made of brick, that was there before the paved road near Morrill Hall.

But for Meyers and the archeologists on the project, time to dig up the building is running out.

Linebaugh said the remains of the boiler room will be removed likely by the end of the week.

“It gives us another piece of information (about) how MSU operated and how it was sustainable,” Goldstein said.

 

The 10-million-year sapphire hard disk

From ExtremeTech:  The 10-million-year sapphire hard disk


A multidisciplinary team of scientists, anthropologists, archeologists, artists, archivists, and linguists have put pen to paper and come up with the ultimate long-term storage solution: two 20cm (8in) sapphire disks, molecularly fused together, with a thin layer of inscribed platinum in between. The disk is expected to have a lifetime of 10 million years.

As you have probably assumed, this 10-million-year hard disk (well, it is very hard, and it is a disk) has nothing to do with computers — rather, this is all about passing important messages to future archeologists. Complex storage devices such as flash drives are no good: There’s just no way of guaranteeing that a future human (or alien?) race will be able to decode the data. With the sapphire disk, up to 40,000 miniaturized pages of text or images can be inscribed in the platinum — and all you need to read the data is a microscope, which hopefully future civilizations will still have access to.

The basic need for such insanely durable storage solutions stems from our use of nuclear power. Nuclear reactors produce radioactive waste that needs to be safely stored for up to 1 million years. A variety of solutions have been proposed — including my personal favorite: disposing waste near subduction zones, so the waste is carried into the core of the Earth — but none have yet been implemented. Once we finally choose a disposal method (mile-deep boreholes are likely to win), we need some way of warning future societies where we’ve buried the waste.

That’s where the sapphire disk comes in: In theory, once you’ve chosen a site to dump the radioactive waste, you would leave a lot of markers buried around the dump site, warning future archeologists and builders that they should stop digging. Until now, the plan has been to engrave warning signs in rocks or lumps of concrete — but this is a problem if the future civilization speaks a different language. With a sapphire disk, you could encode the warning message into every form of written human communication, including words, pictograms, and diagrams. This is why linguists and artists are involved in the project.

The sapphire disk could also be used for other, non-nuclear purposes, of course. Most notably, as a modern-day Rosetta Stone — if we want to preserve and pass on the wealth of knowledge that humans have so far accumulated, we have to ensure that the future inhabitants of Earth actually understand our language. The Rosetta Stone helped us translate ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, and thus unlocked the bulk of Egyptian history for our perusal — and the sapphire disk would serve the exact same purpose, but for English, Chinese, Spanish, and so on.

 

Namibia: New Discovery May Rewrite Nation's Archeology Timeline

From AllAfrica:  Namibia: New Discovery May Rewrite Nation's Archeology Timeline

TWO sheep/goat molars from around 2 300 years ago that were discovered during an archaeological dig in a cave on the farm Omandumba West (adjacent to the popular Ai-Aiba Lodge) in the Erongo Mountains in 2009, went public on Wednesday.

A scientific report describing the discovery and its evidence was published in PLoS ONE and is now available on the internet.

"This discovery will force archeologists to go back to the drawing board regarding the domestication timeline, as well as potential movement patterns, for early herders in the region. New theories will have to be thought up to fit the new time. These teeth have changed the whole story," Dr Eugene Marais of the National Museum of Namibia told The Namibian yesterday.

He explained that since the discovery in 2009, a process of identification, dating and compiling the report on the discovery had to be completed before it could be made public.

The two teeth - one dating back 2 200 years and the other 2 300 years - were discovered in an area that is rich in rock art. The dig was a joint project by the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, France, and the National Museum of Namibia.

The researchers, led by David Pleurdeau of the National Museum of Natural History in Paris and Dr Marais, investigated the remains from the 'Leopard Cave' on the farm. These remains were found with hundreds of other archaeological findings, including stone and bone tools as well as beads and few potsherds.

Marais said it is difficult to determine whether the teeth came from a sheep or goat, but there is "no doubt" that the teeth came from domesticated animals. It is also believed that these animals were eaten by their owners, who believed to have been Khoisan hunters and gatherers, the forefathers of the Nama and San people of Namibia, according to Marais. The teeth are still on loan to Paris and are scheduled to return to Namibia in September, Marais said.

They will be kept in the National Museum's archeological collection, but will not be on public display.
"There's nothing really interesting about two animal molars visually. It's what they are worth to the ongoing debate about the origins of domestication and herding practices in this region that is important. It's too valuable to risk losing in case someone gets the wrong intentions," he said.

What is certain though, according to Marais, is that the teeth provide conclusive evidence of the earliest known occurrence of domestic livestock in southern Africa.

 

Youngsters dig in to archeology

From So.Md.com:  Youngsters dig in to archeology

Four youngsters have been learning everything from how “scary” American Girl dolls are to what life was like in the 1700s at Jefferson Patterson Park and Museum’s annual Archeology Camp.

The camp was the week of June 9 through 13 for children ages 9 through 11.

JPPM Archeology and Education Specialist Katie Dinnel explained the purpose of the camp is “to introduce children to what archeology is through working with professionals here on site.”

Dinnel said through the camp, “we can show that there are a lot of jobs in archeology; a lot of people think archeology is just dirt.”

She said the day starts at 9 a.m. with journal writing and a discussion of what the group will be learning that day.

Then the group goes to a site on JPPM’s campus to help screen dirt excavations for artifacts.

“It helps with distribution of where stuff is,” Dinnel explained. “ ... We’re trying to teach them the importance that we know where we found stuff — it’s location and it’s association.”

Nine-year-old Lucienne Stahlbaum of Huntingtown said she liked working with a large magnet the camp provided to pick up artifacts from the dirt.

“I don’t like sharing the magnet; I like it too much,” Lucienne said, adding that she especially liked finding metal and iron.

After the group leaves the excavation site, they have lunch and visit the the Maryland Archaeological Conservation Laboratory, or MAC Lab, at JPPM, where Dinnel said they recently learned how the lab’s X-ray machine worked through a demonstration with their own toys.

“American Girl dolls are very scary looking,” Dinnel laughed of the doll under the X-ray machine.
“You could see the weights that make the eyes bob up and down,” said Courtney Sheldon, 11, of Prince Frederick.

Dinnel said the group also has worked in JPPM’s artifact collections, which she said have been brought to JPPM by both the state and federal government.

She said the children have been learning how to clean and conserve artifacts “without hurting an item.”
“There are different techniques for different items,” Dinnel said, adding that the campers have been partaking in some “experimental archeology where we figure out how people used to do stuff” like making their own beads out of clay.

She said the day ends with some recreation.

“We go down to the beach and play around in the sand,” Dinnel said.

She said this year’s turnout of four campers was somewhat unusual as the program usually has about 12 to 14 kids.

“We don’t know if it’s the economy or if archeology just isn’t ringing the bell this year,” Dinnel said of the camp, which was $135 for the week.

Atlanta resident Annabeth Bradley, 10, attended the camp while visiting her grandfather for the week.
She said she got the idea to attend from her brother.

“He seemed to love it and I also did Colonial Camp here and I loved the archeology part of it,” Annabeth said.
She said her favorite discovery of the week was “a little piece of Chinese porcelain.”

“It was a really small piece, but I thought it was really awesome,” she said.

Eleven-year-old Massey Link of Port Republic said he liked exploring an area on JPPM that once contained a plantation from the 1700s.

“I know a lot about history, but I don’t know a lot about this part so I thought I could know more,” he said. “There’s a lot of things that have been buried that people didn’t mean to bury.”

New U.S. Transport Law Limits Archeology Studies

From Archaology.com: New U.S. Transport Law Limits Archeology Studies

New U.S. Transport Law Limits Archeology Studies
by David Malakoff on 9 July 2012, 4:38 PM |
Rough ride. New highway funding bill could put some archeologists and environmental researchers in a jam.

The road to funding has gotten considerably bumpier for some American archeologists and environmental researchers. President Barack Obama on Friday signed a major new transportation funding bill that extensively reworks—and cuts—a little-known program that has paid for hundreds of field research projects over the last few decades.

The $101 billion measure, formally known as Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century (MAP-21), reauthorizes federal funding for road and transit projects over the next 2 years. It is the product of a long and contentious debate in Congress that included efforts to eliminate the Transportation Enhancements program (TEP), which for about 2 decades has required states to spend a small portion of their federal transport funds on 12 types of activities, including bike and walking paths, but also "archaeological planning & research," and "environmental mitigation." Between 1992 and 2011, the program fed more than $50 million to archeology and environmental research efforts, helping fund about 200 projects. But some lawmakers argued the nation couldn't afford such spending at a time when roads and bridges were crumbling.

50 Wards in 50 Weekdays: 39th Ward’s archaeology pro Claire Yashar says Albany Park is like ‘living in the country’

From WBEZ:  50 Wards in 50 Weekdays: 39th Ward’s archaeology pro Claire Yashar says Albany Park is like ‘living in the country’
Claire Yashar immigrated to the United States from Belgium in 1969. In no time, she found Albany Park.
“This is the first house my husband and I bought,” Yashar says, sitting in her backyard. “He passed away [a few years ago]. And I liked the neighborhood, so I’m staying.”

It’s not hard to see why. This day, the neighborhood is quiet; people are watering their lawns or walking their dogs.

“It’s a very family-oriented neighborhood. We have young families with little children,” she says.
“We also have not very much traffic, which is very nice because we only have footbridges or no bridges at all going across. So, it’s very localized and I feel like I’m living in the country, yet I’m living in the city.”
When I first ask Yashar if there’s anything she doesn’t like about her neighborhood, she says, “Nothing. That’s why I’ve been living here for many, many years."

But, soon, a small complaint emerges. Yashar wants a ban on Foster Avenue parking, in the eastbound lane, between 4 and 6 p.m.

“There’s always…terrible congestion there,” Yashar says. “And, you know, there’s always one or two person who park there – well, they can, because you allowed to park – and it totally blocks the traffic. You have a lot of people coming out of Northeastern [University].”

That’s a very specific concern. Get on it, city officials. Speaking of, I ask Yashar how she thinks Rahm Emanuel has done in his first year as mayor.

“As far as I know, he’s doing good. I’m not really keeping too much in touch with the news.”

That’s because Yashar is freshly back from a trip to Israel. She still has jet lag, but it was worth it. Yashar is an anthropologist who worked in archaeology.

“That’s why you know Israel was really the place to go. I got lots of pictures,” she says.

This gets me wondering about archaeology sites near Chicago. Lucky for me, I have an expert three feet away.
“There was a site in Thornton, Illinois, just outside of Chicago near the Indiana border. We worked there for a whole season,” Yashar says. “Actually, there was a whole [American Indiana] village there… probably from the 1600s.”

As I leave, she tells me about how the archaeology crew would buy their clothes from a thrift shop so they wouldn’t destroy good outfits. As any two-year-old – or any archaeologist – can tell you, digging is dirty business.

 

Archeology Dig at the White House

From the White House Farm Foundation:  Archeology Dig at the White House

A volunteer jumps up from the pit in the ground and runs over, a small piece of pottery in her hand.
“Very nice, very nice…” Dr. Carole Nash says, peering closely at the sherd. “Late Woodland from 1000-1400 AD, nice patterning… see if you can find more.” She carefully labels a brown paper bag with  information and places the artifact inside.

The sun beats down on the canopies at the White House Farm but the archeologists don’t seem to mind as they brush soil away from the sides of the test pits and search diligently for clues to the past.

It doesn’t take much to excite them – the smallest piece of porcelain, a fragment of glass, a nail.  Little items elicit big responses.

The Massanutten Chapter of the Archeology Society of Virginia has come to Luray, Virginia for a week-long dig at the historic White House located next to the South Fork of the Shenandoah River.  The limestone house where they are searching was constructed in 1760 by Martin Kauffman II, a Mennonite and later, a Baptist preacher.
With over 250 years of European history to discover, the group is trying to figure out how the Kauffman family lived. Where was the privy? Was there a kitchen outside or inside the house? How did they use the vaulted cellar so common to early German architecture? Where was the barn, chicken coop, woodshed, garden?
A week is not long enough to answer these questions and in fact, the discoveries generally bring up additional intrigue.  The centuries unfold in the ground as the test pits get deeper. Native American artifacts are also unearthed, dating back thousands of years.

The White House Farm is located at a very strategic geographic place:  The river narrows, making an easier ford and hence, Native Americans used it as crossing point.  It later became the main Shenandoah River crossing on the New Market to Sperryville turnpike.

“Native people were here for 15,000 years, living in settlements 1000 years before Europeans arrived,” explains Dr. Nash, professor of Archeology at James Madison University and president of the Massanutten Chapter of the Archeology Society of Virginia.
The expanse of time is reflected in the flint from a French flint lock rifle and the Civil War items uncovered – a bullet known as a minié  ball and a brass button, possibly from a soldier’s uniform. In May of 1862, General Stonewall Jackson and his Confederate troops marched across the bridge within eyesight of the White House on their way to the tiny settlement of Hamburg.  From there, they moved north to attack the Union forces near Front Royal.  Jackson ordered the burning of the White House bridge in order to thwart the army which reformed and came after him as he retreated to the south.

For the first days of the dig, the group finds a jumble of time periods due to the agricultural use of the field.  A few photos show corn growing next to the house, indicating that the years of plowing had moved and resorted the items, making it more difficult to place them in sequence.  Even the age of the house was in question as, at first, none of the artifacts found were earlier than about 1790.

 
Dr. Nash decided to hire Bobby Vogt, a neighbor with an excavator business to dig a test trench in order to better understand the history of flood deposition.  The watershed of the South Fork of the Shenandoah River next to the White House is 1372 square miles, meaning all the surface water runoff from the high mountains flows into streams and tributaries, eventually joining with the river. Such large volumes of water can carry large sediment loads which the trench revealed.  Rich, sandy bottom land sediment extend down at least 6 ½ feet on the south west side of the White House.

Mike Madden, George Washington National Forest archeologist and Dr. Nash discuss the feature in the SE corner of the test trench

A large amount of the sediment was likely deposited in the great flood of 1870, the largest and most destructive flood Page County has ever experienced.  However, according to the National Weather Service, even earlier floods have been recorded, including one which occurred in May, 1771, just 11 years after the White House was constructed.

Randy Buie, architectural historian, shares information with Dr. Nash and Cindy Schroer as Linda Waggy searches next to the east wall

The archeologists proceed with care at each stage of the dig, always organized and approaching their work with scientific curiosity and protocols.  Volunteers gently remove the soil, find the goodies, label brown paper bags and sort them according to location.  Workers  at tables in the shade of the two maple trees, carefully wash the items and lay them out on screens to dry.  All the artifacts will be classified and catalogued at James Madison University then returned to the White House Farm Foundation for safe keeping.  Dr. Nash will write a report on the findings with plans for future excavations.

“Rediscovering the truth, that is what archeology is all about,” said Dr. Nash. “I have been doing archeology in the Shenandoah Valley for the last 30 years. This [site] is a dream come true for an archeologist.”

“This is one of the most beautiful places we have ever held a dig,” says Laura Wedin from Blacksburg, Virginia.  She laughs at the heat, labeling herself and her friends literally the “hot ladies of archeology” as temperatures reach the upper 90s at the end of the week.  The volunteers who come to the White House Farm Foundation for the dig are tough, braving the heat and surviving a massive wind storm as they camped next the Shenandoah on Friday night. These are the folks who don’t mind getting dirt under their nails and who carry camp saws in the vehicles, just in case a wind storm blows a sycamore down in their path.

“We are all different – some of us are into genealogy or research or digging,” says Wedin.

“My grandkids think it’s cool I go out and dig in the dirt,” says Linda Waggy.  “It’s like digging in a big sandbox.”

Just then, someone calls out “Wow! Look at this!” and the group immediately migrates to the volunteer standing knee deep in the test pit, ready to see what new treasure has just seen daylight after hundreds of years.

 

The Museum Of The American Revolution Artifacts Await Their New Home

From HuffPost:  The Museum Of The American Revolution Artifacts Await Their New Home

http://www.americanrevolutioncenter.org

PHILADELPHIA — A nondescript building on a quiet street somewhere outside Philadelphia holds a secret stash of treasures that have been waiting patiently for more than a century for a permanent place to call home.
Carefully stacked on shelves, hanging on walls and spread out on tables in a large climate-controlled room are thousands of artifacts from the Revolutionary War. They will remain under wraps in their anonymous location until late 2015, when The Museum of the American Revolution opens in Philadelphia's historic district.
"We're still finding things," curator R. Scott Stephenson said during a recent behind-the-scenes tour of the Colonial-era cache.

He recently discovered, as one example, five law books among the hundreds of storage boxes inscribed with the owner's name: Patrick Henry. More digging unearthed estate and auction records verifying the books belonged to the Founding Father known for his "give me liberty or give me death" speech, and not someone with the same name.

"It's not just inventorying; some of it literally is you find a piece and 6 months later, a year later, you find something else," Stephenson said, "and you triangulate and boom – it's one plus one equals seven."
The collection was started by the Rev. W. Herbert Burk, an Episcopal minister and George Washington enthusiast who founded the Valley Forge Historical Society in the early 1900s. That group is the predecessor of the American Revolution Center, a nonprofit and non-partisan group working to raise $150 million to build the 110,000-square-foot museum.

The Oneida Indian Nation on Wednesday announced a $10 million gift to the museum in honor of Oneidas who fought alongside the Continental Army against British forces. The donation comes in response to a challenge from Philadelphia media magnate and American Revolution Center chairman H.F. "Gerry" Lenfest, who last month said if the museum can raise $40 million he will match it.

Among the roughly 3,000 artifacts waiting in the wings include all manner of muskets and rifles, textiles, cups and canteens, art, books, periodicals and manuscripts.

The item that started the whole collection will be a highlight of the museum: Gen. George Washington's sleeping and office tent. The 20-foot-long canvas marquee – a little like an outdoor Oval Office – was purchased in 1909 from Mary Custis Lee, Martha Washington's great-great-granddaughter.

"The objects are the witnesses, the touchstones for stories about extraordinary people and circumstances that can be incredibly powerful," Stephenson said. "There's plenty of drama, plenty of things that resonate in our own lives, plenty of aspects that are completely foreign to the way we think or what we've experienced."
Experts are currently developing how the exhibits will look. The idea is to make the Revolutionary period real and relatable to visitors, "not just looking at a bunch of, you know, old brown things on a wall," Stephenson said.

"Although I do love those old brown things, absolutely," he said with a laugh. "But you can't just do a beautiful building and decorate it with objects. The era in which you could line up a bunch of tea cups on a shelf is just not with us anymore."

After a contentious plan was nixed to build the museum at Valley Forge, about 20 miles outside Philadelphia, the American Revolution Center and the National Park Service made a land swap that kept Valley Forge National Park as-is and brought the museum to Philadelphia. Its future home located steps from the National Constitution Center, the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall and Carpenter's Hall should benefit all the institutions through program collaborations and artifact exchanges, Stephenson said.

Gordon Wood, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and scholar of the American Revolution, said while Valley Forge is of especially keen interest to military buffs, the Revolution "infused into our culture everything we believe in: liberty, equality, constitutionalism, all our noblest ideals."

"It should be in Philadelphia because that's really where it all began," Wood said. "It's going to be more than the military history, that's a limited view of the Revolution and it has to be seen in its broadest context."

Amulet depicting ancient Egyptian dwarf god Bes found among collection of artefacts in UK

From Ahmran Online: Amulet depicting ancient Egyptian dwarf god Bes found among collection of artefacts in UK 

A unique ancient Egyptian green faience amulet was discovered by a curator at Swansea University's Egypt Centre in Wales on Tuesday.

Carolyn Graves-Brown stumbled upon the amulet when examining a collection of 50 objects loaned to the centre by Woking College in England.

The amulet depicts the face of the ancient Egyptian dwarf god Bes, the protector of households. It has bulging eyes, a long tongue sticking out of its face and a crown of feathers. The amulet has a hole at its top so it can be suspended on a necklace or a pin.

In addition to the amulet, the collection includes a Sokar hawk, a large number of 3000-year-old ushabti figurines (servant statuettes), two glass bottles from the reign of Cleopatra and two amulets.

Grave-Brown told Live Science that she did not recognise the importance of the amulet until she learned of similar objects at the British Museum. She was then able to determine that it was a faience god Bes bell amulet once used to protect mothers and children from evil spirits.

“It is one of a very few known to exist,” she said.

The amulet is well preserved but fragile and could be easily broken, said Graves-Brown.

“Faience was very often used for objects that had a magical or religious significance in ancient Egypt,” she told Live Science. 

Few existing Bes bell amulets have been found in their original context, which is why there are several theories about their purpose, she added.

They may have been worn by pregnant mothers or children, or perhaps placed beside the child while they slept as magical protection against evil.

However, there could be another explanation, she said.  [WHICH IS???]

 

Sri Lanka's pre-historic human to be sent to Germany for testing

From Columbo Page: Sri Lanka's pre-historic human to be sent to Germany for testing


July 07, Colombo: Sri Lanka's pre-historic human skeleton found recently from an archeological site in Kalutara district of Western Province will be sent to Germany for further studies, Archeology Department officials have said.

Samples of the skeleton found in the Fa-Hien cave archaeological site in Pahiyangala of Kalutara district have been collected for DNA studies and the skeletal parts and DNA samples will be sent to Germany for further research, the officials said.

A team of Sri Lankan archeologists and an archeology expert, Dr. Jay Stock from the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Cambridge has collected the samples of the skeleton at the site.

The excavated skeleton is to be kept frozen to preserve it from the environment the Director General of Archaeology, Dr. Senarath Dissanayake has said.

The skeleton is believed to be about 37,000 years old and belonged to the Homo sapiens species known as Balangoda Man. Along with the skeleton, stone tools and glass bead jewelry have been found in the cave. According to the scientists this is the first complete human skeleton found in South Asia.
 

Who was she? Mystery of the bejewelled Anglo-Saxon woman found buried beside sacrificial cow in unique discovery

From Daily Mail:  Who was she? Mystery of the bejewelled Anglo-Saxon woman found buried beside sacrificial cow in unique discoveryThe remains of a bejewelled Anglo-Saxon woman discovered in a burial site beside a cow have been described as a 'bizarre find' by archaeologists.


It is thought the grave, which was unearthed in Oakington, Cambridgeshire, by Manchester Metropolitan and Central Lancashire university students, is the first of its kind to be discovered in the UK.

Researchers initially believed the animal skeleton was a horse, but after further analysis it emerged that the woman’s bones were actually lying alongside those of a cow.

While human skeletons – from male warriors - have previously been uncovered next to horses the discovery of the woman next to a cow which dates from the 5th century, is believed to be a fresh sight.

There are only 31 horse burials in Britain and they are all with men and student Jake Nuttall said the team had been excited when they thought the find was a horse, but he said the discovery that it was a cow made it ‘even more bizarre.’
The female skeleton was found with brooches and hundreds of amber and decorated beads.

Wealthy: The female skeleton was found with brooches and hundreds of amber and decorated beads

She also had a complete chatelaine [keychain] set, which is an iron girdle and a symbol of her high indicating she was of a high standing in society.


Co-director of the excavation, Dr Duncan Sayer, from the University of Central Lancashire, reportedly told the BBC: 'This is the first animal to be discovered with a woman from this period and it's really interesting that it's a cow, a symbol of economic and domestic wealth and power.
'It's also incredibly early to find any grave of a woman buried with such obvious wealth.'


The findings point to the woman having access to the community's wealth with Dr Sayer speculating that she was a member of the regional elite. The objects are believed to describe her identity to the people who attended her funeral.


Dr Faye Simpson, from Manchester Metropolitan, said a decision to sacrifice a cow would not have been taken lightly because its tremendous source of food and the huge cost of rearing it. 


Dr Sayer said the find was so special she didn’t anticipate discovering anything as significant in her lifetime.
 

Of biblical proportions

From The Hawk Eye:  Of biblical proportions

Despite majoring in history and anthropology, 21-year-old Sarah Nevling never has watched an "Indiana Jones" movie in its entirety.

She doesn't have to watch a Hollywood movie about archaeology for a vicarious thrill, though. Nevling just spent a month digging through the remains of an ancient Jewish village and synagogue in northern Israel, and the wonders she found far outweigh any fiction she could watch.

A Burlington native who graduated from Burlington High School and attends the University of Oklahoma, Nevling grew up wanting to be an archaeologist - ever since she saw a video about ancient Egypt in middle school.

"I thought that was so cool," she said. 


Nevling, who now makes her home in Norman, Okla., just returned from a college-sponsored archaeological dig in the ancient Jewish village of Huqoq, which lies in Israel's Galilee region.

"It was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity," Nevling said. "It's definitely an experience I'll never forget."

The dig site has been making a lot of news this week, and for good reason. Experts from the University of North Carolina and the Israeli Antiques Authority recently discovered a synagogue in the village dating back to the fourth century, which has a mosaic floor depicting the biblical figure of Samson lighting torches between the tail of two foxes, as described in the book of Judges - the seventh book of the Hebrew Bible.

That makes it a monumental find in the world of archaeology.

"I actually heard about it from my Hebrew teacher, and I thought, 'I'm an archeology student, and I'm Jewish. What better place is there for me to be,' " said Nevling.

Archaeologists came upon the ancient Jewish village while digging through the remnants of a Palestinian village that was abandoned in 1948 and later bulldozed. The first excavation of Huqoq happened last year, and when Nevling found out college students were needed to aid in the ongoing archaeological dig, she jumped at the chance.

"I never just wanted to study history. I wanted to find it," Nevling said. "You get this rush when you're hoeing, and you find a coin."

During her dig, Nevling found several ancient, dime-sized coins that turned green after years of corrosion. Once Nevling and her fellow volunteers found the coins, they immediately stopped hoeing and started sifting through the dirt so they could find more.

"We couldn't touch those with our bare hands because of the oil on our hands," Nevling said. "We had to pick them up with trowels and put them in baggies, and they were sent off to be studied in a lab in Jerusalem."

Nevling was joined by about 40 other student volunteers who broke into groups and concentrated on individual grids within the site. Diggers were divided between the village and the synagogue, and Nevling was assigned to the village.

It wasn't an easy job, but Nevling counts it as a fulfilling one. She left on a 10-hour plane ride from New York to Israel on the last day of May, and the first thing she noticed upon on her arrival was the heat. Iowa has been extremely hot over the last week, but Israel was even worse.

"It was at least 100 degrees every day, and we had 50 to 80 percent humidity," Nevling said. "We were blessed with two days of complete cloud cover, and that dropped the temperature six or seven degrees."

Armed with picks, hoes and trowels, Nevling and her fellow students dug through layers and layers of earth, starting at 5 a.m. every day (except Saturday) and finishing up at noon. At night, they stayed at a nearby hostel and even got to take a few trips to other archaeological sites around the region.

"We found pottery, animal bones, jewelry, glass," Nevling said.

Not all the artifacts Nevling found were from the same era, either. By the time she dug all the way into the Iron Age (which is from 1200 to 550 B.C.E.), Nevling had to use an industrial-strength ladder to climb out of the 9-foot-deep hole she was in.

"We had to look at the changes in the dirt. You would be on one time period, and you would hit a plaster floor, and then the foundation. When you pull that up, the dirt is completely different," Nevling said.

The village of Huqoq is mentioned in the biblical book of 1 Chronicles as part of the inheritance of the Tribe of Asher, and is said to have flourished throughout the Roman and Byzantine periods.

Digs will continue at the site next year, and Nevling, who still has a couple of years left before she graduates, plans on going back then.

Students Dig Archeology Gig with Schiele Museum

From UNC Charlotte :  Students Dig Archeology Gig with Schiele Museum

While many of their peers were sitting in air-conditioned classrooms during the first summer session, some UNC Charlotte students were literally getting their hands dirty while making some important discoveries about Mecklenburg County’s past.

Led by UNC Charlotte Anthropology Professor Janet Levy and Alan May, curator of anthropology at Gaston County’s Schiele Museum, the students battled ticks, poison ivy (and enjoyed spring sunshine and fresh air) as they unearthed artifacts from the site of the historic Holly Bend house, which was built between 1795 and 1800 in the northwest corner of the county.

(In the photo, Alan May confers with a UNC Charlotte during the springtime dig.)

 

The class began on May 21 and ended on June 14 and the students worked in the field from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Monday through Friday. The purpose was to conduct basic exploratory work to provide information for the planned development of the site, which was purchased for $6.6 million by the county.

The dig is the latest example of an ongoing collaboration dating back more than 25 years, between the university and the Gastonia museum. According to Levy, the project provides students with a hands-on experience in the field. In turn, the museum benefits by having the opportunity to collaborate with faculty experts on a local project.

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, the Holly Bend house was built by Robert Davidson, son of John Davidson of Revolutionary War fame. It was once center of a 2,800-acre plantation and is an example of Federal Neoclassicism style.

The county plans to restore the house in partnership with local preservation groups and eventually open it for public tours and events. For now, it provides an educational experience for students who are interested in the past.

The work is difficult and very meticulous. During one day’s work in early June, the students used shovels and trowels to search through 2-meter-square grids for fragments of pottery, bottles and other items. When something of interest was located, its precise location was documented.

While some students were busy digging, others were taking buckets of dirt and sifting the soil through a screen to pick out anything noteworthy. Some early discoveries included fragments of Pearl ware, which dates to the time of the construction of Holly Bend.

“Getting out in the field and breaking a sweat doing this sort of work is not that bad,” said Doug Sanders, 23, a senior applied anthropology major from Raleigh, wiping a bead of sweat from his brow. “I would absolutely enjoy it if I could turn this into my career.”

 

Bulgarian Cabinet Funds Latest Archeology Finds

From Novinite.com:  Bulgarian Cabinet Funds Latest Archeology Finds

Bulgarian archeologists claim to have found a vampire skeleton in the Black Sea town of Sozopol over the iron stick piercing the chest. Photo by NIM 

The Bulgarian government is planning to slate additional funding for archeological excavations on the southern Black Sea coast, according to Finance Minister, Simeon Djankov.

Djankov spoke during his visit of the Sarafovo archeological site neat the Black Sea city of Burgas.
Meanwhile, on Saturday, archeologists uncovered an ancient city district under Black Sea waters near the Akin cape in the vicinity of the town of Chernomorets. The digs there are part of the Via Pontica project, financed by the cabinet.

The skeleton of a buried man with an iron stick in his chest, found near the town of Sozopol, which became known as the Bulgarian vampire, is also part of this project.

The Council of Ministries will issue a decree to slate at least an additional BGN 150 000 for the digs near Sarafovo and Chernomorets, according to Djankov, who adds the later have yielded interesting finds only a week after excavations there started for the first time.

 

 

Governor promotes tourism in Revolutionary spot

From Newstimes:  Governor promotes tourism in Revolutionary spot

Gov. Dannel P.Malloy, left, talks with Dan Cruson, president of the Archeology Society of Connecticut, at Putnam Park in Redding Monday, July 2, 2012. Photo: Michael Duffy / CT 

 

 

REDDING -- When Gov. Dannel P. Malloy last visited Putnam Memorial Park in Redding, he was a Boy Scout on a camping trip.

"I'm 57 years old now,'' Malloy said Monday, while touring the park. "It was a long time ago."
Four decades or so of reading gave the governor a different perspective on the park.
"I have a much greater interest in the state's history now,'' he said. "Connecticut played a major role in the Revolutionary War. Just because someone drew a line between Connecticut and Massachusetts doesn't change that.''

Malloy's visit to the park, accompanied by Dan Esty, state commissioner of Energy and Environmental Protection; Thomas Tyler, director of state parks; and local historian Dan Cruson, of Newtown, was part of a five-stop swing through western Connecticut to promote the state's new $27 million tourism campaign "Connecticut: Still Revolutionary.''

Putnam Park, site of the 1778-79 winter encampment of American forces led by Gen. Israel Putnam, the state's Valley Forge, was a logical part of the itinerary.

"It's our most Revolutionary War state park,'' Esty said.

When the state's new tourism pitch was unveiled in May, it was criticized for not including any footage or mention of western Connecticut.

The trip, which included stops at Lake Compounce in Bristol. Blackie's hot dog stand in Cheshire, Weir Farm National Historic Site in Redding and Sunset Vineyard in Goshen, showcased what this part of state has to offer.

Cruson, who helped with some of the park's recent archeological work and is president of the Archeological Society of Connecticut, began the tour with a stop at the park's visitor center.

He then led Malloy and others to the site of one of the park's three encampments, showing them a building that has been recently renovated with a $65,000 state grant.

Once thought to be an officer's quarters, Cruson said he now thinks it served a much humbler function,a magazine for the army's powder.

"It was built into the hillside,'' Cruson said. "If there was an explosion, the front might blow out. But the top and sides were built into a ridge."

It is also the first state park, Cruson said, although the people at Sherwood Island State Park, dedicated as the first official state park in 1914, might disagree.

"We were a park three years before them,'' Cruson said.

Aalong with a good dose of history, Esty said Putnam Memorial State Park offers visitors a great chance to get out and walk the landscape.

The same holds true for the state's 16 other parks, 32 forests and 25 wildlife areas.

"There's a park, a brook, a pond or a beach for everyone,'' Esty said.

 

The Danger of a Country Ruled by Religion - TImbuktu

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Timbuktu Location of Timbuktu within Mali

Timbuktu formerly also spelled Timbuctoo and Timbuktoo, is a town in the West African nation of Mali situated 15 km (9.3 mi) north of the River Niger on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert. The town is the capital of the Timbuktu Region, one of the eight administrative regions of Mali. It had a population of 54,453 in the 2009 census.

Starting out as a seasonal settlement, Timbuktu became a permanent settlement early in the 12th century. After a shift in trading routes, Timbuktu flourished from the trade in salt, gold, ivory and slaves, and it became part of the Mali Empire early in the 13th century. In the first half of the 15th century the Tuareg tribes took control of the city for a short period until the expanding Songhay Empire absorbed the city in 1468. A Moroccan army defeated the Songhay in 1591, and made Timbuktu, rather than Gao, their stronghold. The invaders established a new ruling class, the arma, who after 1612 became independent of Morocco. However, the golden age of the city was over and it entered a long period of decline. Different tribes governed until the French took over in 1893, a situation that lasted until it became part of the current Republic of Mali in 1960. Presently Timbuktu is impoverished and suffers from desertification. Several initiatives are being undertaken to restore the historic manuscripts still kept in the city. Meanwhile, tourism forms an important source of income.

In its Golden Age, the town's numerous Islamic scholars and extensive trading network made possible an important book trade: together with the campuses of the Sankore Madrasah, an Islamic university, this established Timbuktu as a scholarly centre in Africa. Several notable historic writers, such as Shabeni and Leo Africanus, have described Timbuktu. These stories fuelled speculation in Europe, where the city's reputation shifted from being extremely rich to being mysterious. This reputation overshadows the town itself in modern times, to the point where it is best known in Western culture as an expression for a distant or outlandish place.

On 1 April 2012, one day after the capture of Gao, Timbuktu was captured from the Malian military by the Tuareg rebels of the MNLA and Ansar Dine.^[2] Five days later, the MNLA declared the region independent of Mali as the nation of Azawad.^[3] The newly declared political entity has not been recognized by any local nations or the international community


From Sydney Morning Herald: Timbuktu's tombs destroyed by militants

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A file picture of a mosque in Timbuktu. Photo: AFP

Islamist militants, swinging pick-axes and shouting God's praise, have destroyed ancient tombs of Muslim saints in Mali's fabled city of Timbuktu, sparking international condemnation.

The rampage of destruction in the UNESCO designated world-heritage city comes after three months of unrest in Mali's remote desert north, which has raised fears of a new Islamist extremist haven in west Africa.
Ansar Dine and other Al-Qaeda-linked militant groups have imposed strict sharia law since sweeping across northern Mali in the chaotic aftermath of a March 22 coup in the capital, Bamako.

"They have raped Timbuktu today. It is a crime," said a source close to a local imam in Timbuktu, known as the "City of 333 Saints".

Witnesses said the Islamists, who regard shrines as idolatrous, had destroyed the tombs of Sidi Mahmoud, Sidi Moctar and Alpha Moya.

In addition to three historic mosques, Timbuktu is home to 16 cemeteries and mausoleums, according to the UNESCO website.

A spokesman for the group, Sanda Ould Boumama, vowed: "Ansar Dine will today destroy every mausoleum in the city. All of them, without exception."

Alissandra Cummins, the chair of UNESCO's executive committee, said: "This is tragic news for us all.
"I appeal to all those engaged in the conflict in Timbuktu to exercise their responsibility - for the sake of future generations, spare the legacy of their past."

Mali's government in Bamako denounced the "destructive fury", comparing it to war crimes and threatened action on the national and international level.

Former colonial power France condemned "the systematic violation of these places of reverence and prayer" and appealed "for an end to this violence and this intolerance".

A witness said that early Saturday morning, about "30 fighters of Ansar Dine moved towards the mausoleum of Sidi Mahmoud" in the city's north.

"Some had guns. They did not shoot. Then they started shouting 'Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar!' (God is greatest! God is greatest!) And with pick-axes and hoes, they started to break down the mausoleum."
The Ansar Dine spokesman suggested Saturday's action was in retaliation for a UNESCO decision on Thursday to put the World Heritage site, a cradle of Islamic learning founded in the fifth century, on its endangered list.

"God is unique. All of this is haram (forbidden in Islam). We are all Muslims. UNESCO is what?" he said, declaring that Ansar Dine was acting "in the name of God".

UNESCO's general director, Irina Bokova, confirmed that Islamist militants from the Ansar Dine group had destroyed three sacred tombs in Timbuktu, declaring in a statement that "there is no justification for such wanton destruction".

Witnesses in Timbuktu said that the gangs had destroyed the mausoleum of a saint whose 15th century tomb was already desecrated in May by members of Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Magreb, another of the groups in control in the north.

The UN cultural agency said its decision to place both the town and the nearby Tomb of Askia in Gao on its List of World Heritage in Danger "aims to raise cooperation and support for the sites threatened by the armed conflict".