The Masked Man
Several weeks ago, I finally entered the 21st century. I didn’t get the latest smartphone, AirPods, or an electric vehicle, nor did I join the Noom diet. I…
Tag: Archaeology
The UNESCO Site That Never Was
The people of Hasankeyf, Turkey, have long enjoyed the nearby Tigris River, seen here in 2019. Recently, the creation of the Ilisu Dam has submerged their town. Burak…
Translating Truth: Heaven’s Vault and Its Message to Gamers
By Catherine Hill If you’re a gamer, chances are you’ve played, seen, or at least heard of Heaven’s Vault, the newest game from Inkle Studios. In this adventure, players…
Venice’s Black Death and the Dawn of Quarantine
The island of Lazzaretto Nuovo, shown here, was one of the isles where the city of Venice quarantined plague-stricken individuals. Archeoclub d’Italia Sede di Venezia Just beyond th…
Why Did Passenger Pigeons Go Extinct?
Nineteenth-century hunters in Louisiana shoot passenger pigeons. Smith Bennett/Wikimedia Commons This article was originally published at The Conversation and has been republished under C…
Coronavirus and Coping With Death
While sheltering in place in California during the COVID-19 pandemic, I have been spending a lot of time thinking about my graduation day—but not because it was particularly…
Will Asia Rewrite Human History?
Archaeologists dig at a site called Al Wusta in Saudi Arabia. Klint Janulis Please note that this article includes images of human remains. The Nefud Desert is a…
Holocaust Archaeology Proves Deniers Wrong
At the Treblinka extermination camp in Poland, an estimated 800,000 Jews were murdered by Nazis and their collaborators. Richard Radford/Getty Images This article was originally published…
Seeking Urban Metabolisms through Archaeology by Sarah Hayes
The metabolism of a city is perhaps nowhere more apparent than in its archaeology. Decades of excavations triggered by cultural heritage management legislation in Melbourne, Australia reveal a…
The Scientific Sorcery of Radiocarbon Dating
Several years ago, I went back to Chicago to see some old friends: artifacts, really—ancient sandals to be precise. The sandals were at the Field Museum of Natural…
When Marine Mammals Clash With Archaeological Heritage
Sea lion populations off the California coast bounced back after the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972. NOAA/NOS/NMS/CINMS; National Marine Sanctuaries Media Library Off the southern C…
Neanderthals Traversed Vast Distances
Chagyrskaya Cave holds clues about Neanderthal dispersals from what is today Eastern Europe to Southern Siberia. Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography of the Siberian Branch of the Russian…
Spy Plane Photos Open Windows Into Ancient Worlds
NASA painted this U-2 plane to cover up its real purpose: espionage. Armstrong Flight Research Center/NASA In a darkened room of the U.S. National Archives, we stood over…
What Bacterial Cultures Reveal About Ours
Herder Dalaimyagmar and her husband, Byambaa, demonstrate how to press whey from curds in creating aaruul, a staple dairy product in Mongolia. Heirloom Microbes Project. In the remote…
What Really Happened at Herculaneum?
The volcanic Mount Vesuvius is visible above the ruins of Pompeii, now an archaeological site in Italy. Marc Proudfoot/Flickr When Mount Vesuvius, on the west coast of Italy,…
What Modern Extremes Taught Me About Noise in the Ancient World
Today the cacophony of modern life makes it difficult to find, much less achieve, true silence. In our electrified world, there is always a rattle or hum somewhere.…
Why the Earth Must Be Mapped
A lidar scan of a site in Mexico reveals the boundaries of a ceremonial area. Chris Fisher The climate crisis represents humanity’s greatest threat. Our daily news is…
Restoring Dignity to Stolen Ancestors
A man stands on the farm in Sutherland, South Africa, where a medical student once unethically exhumed nine bodies for scientific study. Je’nine May/UCT Almost 100 years ago,…
Neolithic Plumbing: The Landscape is a Machine
Water is, among its many attributes, fluid. Left to its own devices it runs, spills, flows, leaks, crashes, and splashes. Holding H2O still is nearly impossible above 0°C.…
Why Did Chinese Farmers Switch to Wheat?
Wheat is now a favored crop in many parts of China. Jie Zhao/Getty Images Today China is the world’s biggest consumer of wheat, which the country uses to…
Walls beneath the Waves
Geoarchaeological analyses in New York Harbor reveal intriguing evidence of past oceanic transgression even as we fortify our coasts for the future. Millions of people live, work, and…
The Hidden Color Code in Mimbres Pottery
The patterns in black-and-white Classic Mimbres pottery may have represented colors. phoca2004/Flickr Classic Mimbres pottery is famous and admired today for its beautiful, minimalist sty…
Digging up the Dead
The Slavia Field School in Mortuary Archaeology in Drawsko, Poland, unearthed a 400-year-old cemetery. Joanna Pearce Excavating a 17th-century cemetery in the small town of Drawsko, Polan…
Digging Up Woodstock
The 1969 Woodstock Music and Art Fair left behind garbage and other materials that can be traced by archaeologists. Bettmann /Getty Images On a cloudy morning in October 2017,…