Palaeolithic bone tool workshop identified in Spanish cave
Archaeologists found an alignment of large limestone rocks and sandstone cobbles that appears to have been arranged by the cave’s occupants.
Cave
Researchers identify first direct evidence of ancient drug use in Europe
Until now, evidence of drug use in prehistoric Europe has mostly been derived from archaeobotanical remains, artistic depictions, and chemical analysis of artefacts
Early limb amputation in Borneo
The fossilised remains, which date to between 31,000 and 30,000 years ago, were found during excavations at Liang Tebo. Previously, the earliest known evidence of surgical amputation came from a farmer in France c.7,000 years ago
The elusive cave writing of Lascaux
When Jean-Luc Champerret explored the Lascaux caves soon after their rediscovery, he saw not paintings but ancient writing. With the publication of his extraordinarily imaginative interpretation, Simon Coppock revisits the caves and their elusive, poetic markings.
Ancient Nottingham caves part of plan to regenerate city
The new ‘City of Caves’ project will see researchers exploring historical records and creating 3D laser scans.
Europe’s earliest infant female burial sheds light on Mesolithic funerary practices
Radiocarbon dating revealed the child, nicknamed 'Neve’, lived around 10,000 years ago
Anchor Church: The refuge of a 9th-century royal religious recluse?
The rock-cut remains of Anchor Church, near Foremark in Derbyshire, have long been identified as an 18th-century folly. Recent analysis of the cave’s architectural features, though, has revealed clues to a possible early medieval origin for the site. CA reports on the newly published research.
Newly-discovered Spanish cave art depicts honey-gathering
According to the researchers, this is the most elaborate and well-preserved depiction of honey-gathering documented within Levantine art to date.
25,000-year-old human genome recovered from cave soil
Further analysis revealed the genome derived from a female individual, or multiple females.
Palaeolithic children’s footprints discovered in Spanish cave
The footprints were left by a group children, aged between six to seven years old, playing in the cave recess sometime during the Middle-Upper Palaeolithic c. 60,000-15,000 years ago.
Australia’s ancient rock art
Researchers in Australia have used wasp nests on a cave wall to identify the earliest known example of in situ rock art in the country: a painting of a kangaroo created over 17,000 years ago.
Discoveries in the Judean Desert
The newly discovered fragments consist of over 20 pieces of parchment belonging to the Minor Prophets Scroll, including sections of the books of Zechariah and Nahum.
Kolombangara: surveying a forgotten Second World War fortress
Early this year, a team set out to survey long-overlooked fortifications on the island of Kolombangara. Their work is shedding new light on preparations to repel an anticipated Allied invasion, as Nikolaus Hochstein Cox reveals.
Darkness dispelled: exploring 1,500 years of life and death at the Sculptor’s Cave
The Sculptor’s Cave, on Scotland’s north-east coast, is best known for the Pictish carvings that give the site its name. Recent research by Ian Armit and Lindsey Büster, however, has drawn together evidence of enigmatic prehistoric funerary practices that were carried out at this remote spot for hundreds of years. Current Archaeology's Carly Hilts reports.
World News: Egypt, China, Eurasia
News touching on CT scans of the mummified remains of Pharaoh Seqenenre-Taa-II (c.1558-1553 BC), a mistake uncovered on 800-year-old wall paintings in a cave in China, and a new theory concerning the domestication of dogs by early humans in Eurasia.
Dating techniques identify possible earliest evidence for cave occupation
Wonderwerk Cave was first excavated in the 1940s. Its archaeological stratigraphy comprises evidence of human activity spanning from the Early Stone Age in South Africa to the present day.
New dating for Australia’s ancient paintings
While the kangaroo is the oldest known painting in Australia so far, there may even be older paintings yet to be discovered.
World news: Indonesia, Germany, Mexico
Earliest known rock art ever found in Indonesia; skulls relating to sacrificial ceremony found in Tenochtitlan; German enigma machine discovered in Bay of Gelting.
Darkness Visible: the Sculptor’s Cave, Covesea, from the Bronze Age to the Picts
Caves can be portals to otherworlds, and Covesea Cave on Scotland’s Moray Firth is no exception. Armit and Büster’s handsomely produced volume transports us back in time to both the late Bronze Age and Roman Iron Age, revealing exciting new…
Reassessing the timeline for Neanderthals in Europe
The team from the ORAU and a group of researchers from across Europe have applied a compound-dating technique to Neanderthals, this time from Belgium, and once again the results have caused a re-evaluation of the timeline of Neanderthals in Eurasia.
Indonesia’s oldest cave art discovered
Archaeologists now believe that they have found a painting on the island of Sulawesi that pre-dates all other examples in the region, and may even be the earliest piece of representational art currently known.
800-year-old mistake uncovered by modern imaging
A team of researchers have discovered evidence of a mistake made more than 700 years ago while investigating the painted Buddhist temples in the Mogao Caves in Dunhuang, China.
Assessing the accessibility of Atxurra
Cave painting is one of the earliest forms of human culture, one of the first outlets of our creativity. But the meaning that these paintings had to the communities who created them remains a bit of a mystery. Who painted…
Artists on the edge of the world: exploring the British Isles’ earliest art at Les Varines, Jersey
Archaeologists excavating a 15,000-year-old campsite at Les Varines, Jersey, have recovered ten fragments of stone decorated with hundreds of interweaving lines. Recently published analysis of these ‘plaquettes’ suggests that they may represent the earliest artworks yet identified in the British Isles. Carly Hilts reports.
World News: Norway, Indonesia, Spain
Viking ship burial in Norway A Viking ship burial was recently discovered at Gjellestad, Norway, during a ground-penetrating radar survey. It is now being excavated by the Museum of Cultural History in Oslo. The ship is just one part of…
Neanderthal neighbours: tracing evidence for our closest hominin relatives in Britain
Neanderthals have long been stereotyped as our less-capable cousins, but advances in archaeological research have given fascinating new insights into the lives of our closest hominin relatives and the world they inhabited, as Dr Rebecca Wragg Sykes explains.
World news in brief
10,000 year old footprints identified in New Mexico, Neolithic assemblage found in Norway, and AMS dating of Upper Palaeolithic cave art in Spain.
World News: Mexico, Germany, Kazakhstan
Ochre mining in Mexico Evidence for the mining of red ochre has been discovered in the now-submerged caves of Quintana Roo in Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula. Dated to between 12,000 and 10,000 years ago, this is the earliest-known exploitation of this…
Lascaux IV
As far as I could tell, every minor contour of the original has been replicated, as of course have the paintings themselves.
Medieval carvings found in cave near Guildford
A possible 14th-century shrine adorned with medieval carvings has been discovered in a cave following a landslip near Guildford. The initial discovery was made by rail workers from Osborne carrying out repair works on behalf of Network Rail, after which…