Strands of human hair from the Bronze Age burial and cult-cave of Es Cà rritx in Menorca have been analysed, providing the first direct evidence of ancient drug-use in Europe. Around 1450 BC, Menorca’s inhabitants started to use natural caves as funerary structures. Among them was Es Cà rritx, which had already…
In 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket was killed in his cathedral by knights linked to his former friend King Henry II. But how did Becket become a revered saint and protector of the king?…
'In 1638, Kircher was lowered into an awakening Vesuvius to advance his geological knowledge.'…
World news stories covering the restoration of the Mausoleum of Augusts (Rome), the restoration of the Ghent Altarpiece (Belgium), and a sculpture of the capital of the Kingdom of Ghana.…
What remains of Palmyra’s substantial ruins, stretching across 3km, gives a sense of the city’s prosperity and grandeur, especially between the 1st and 3rd centuries AD.…
Dated to c.AD 950 on stylistic grounds, the hoard contains three significant pieces of jewellery deposited in a single event, possibly by a wealthy individual.…
While the kangaroo is the oldest known painting in Australia so far, there may even be older paintings yet to be discovered.…
When, in 1908, Julius von Schlosser published Art and Curiosity Cabinets of the Late Renaissance (originally Die Kunst- und Wunderkammern der Spätrenaissance), he had been working for more than 15 years in what is now the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna, where he became Director of the Collections of Arms and…
The Rosetta Stone was the key to unlocking the secrets of Egyptian hieroglyphs. The results of Jean-François Champollion’s work on the Stone’s inscription may be well known, but other scholars – with different attitudes towards ancient Egypt – also took up the challenge. Jed Buchwald and Diane Greco Josefowicz…
Since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the 1940s, the caves - which have preserved fragile objects like the scrolls – have been the target of looters.…
After it was discovered hidden in a Roman temple with other works of art, a bronze statue of Victory attracted the attention of rulers and writers, who praised and sought copies of the ancient masterpiece. Now restored, the winged statue is back on view in its former home. Dalu Jones…
The cross is ubiquitous in medieval Christian iconography. As it was on the cross that Jesus died, bringing believers salvation, it is a critical component of the religion. But, despite the ubiquity and apparent simplicity of the instantly recognisable form, it has lent itself to substantial variation throughout history. The…
Excavations at the Roman villa of Civita Giuliana have uncovered a remarkable four-wheeled ceremonial chariot.…
A leading handbook of scripts and writing that runs to almost a thousand pages, The World’s Writing Systems (1996), edited by Peter Daniels and William Bright, contains scarcely any reference to the Aztec writing system of Mesoamerica. Wikipedia’s entry on ‘Aztec writing’ is brief and refers to no book-length study.…
Just decades after it was founded, ibn Tulun’s capital al-Qata’i‘ was razed to the ground. The Great Mosque of ibn Tulun, the oldest mosque in Africa to survive in its original form, still stands in Cairo today, and through its magnificent architecture offers a chance to encounter the former…
A new home in Cardiff Bay for the Museum of Military Medicine has been given the green light by the local council. Currently based in the village of Mytchett, Surrey, where it was long known as the Army Medical Services Museum, the site contains a collection of more than 30,000…
• The sacred power of shiny objects
• Tigray: painted churches in peril
• Stabiae: Roman land of leisure
• Sutton Hoo: the story behind The Dig
• Galen: the emperor’s doctor
• A helping hand for heritage…
A Roman ring revisited A Roman intaglio discovered in 1995 in Colchester, UK, pre-dates the Roman invasion of Britain, research for the new online database for Colchester + Ipswich Museums suggests. Engraved with the image of Mars, the Roman god of war, the carnelian gem was once mounted in an…
Recent research on an intriguing assemblage of artefacts excavated from a Classic Maya sweat bath in Guatemala is revealing new details about ritual activity at the unusual structure. This sweat bath at Xultun, named Los Sapos (‘the toads’), was explored by archaeologists from the San Bartolo-Xultun Archaeological Project (directed by…
Home-improvements and gardening have been on the rise under lockdown in the UK, and, in a few cases, work in the garden has led to archaeological discoveries. One household in the New Forest area in southern England uncovered a Tudor coin hoard while pulling up weeds in their back garden.…
A missing piece of wood, one of the three objects collected from the Great Pyramid of Giza by engineer Waynman Dixon in 1872, has been rediscovered in a cigar box in the University of Aberdeen’s museum collection. Two of the objects Dixon discovered in the Queen’s Chamber of the pyramid…