Feature Channels: Archaeology and Anthropology

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New research shows that modern human skeletons evolved into their lightly built form only relatively recently — after the start of the Holocene about 12,000 years ago, and even more recently in some human populations. The work, based on high-resolution imaging of bone joints from modern humans and chimpanzees as well as from fossils of extinct human species, shows that for millions of years, extinct humans had high bone density until a dramatic decrease in recent modern humans.

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The Paleolithic diet, or caveman diet, a weight-loss craze in which people emulate the diet of plants and animals eaten by early humans during the Stone Age, gives modern calorie-counters great freedom because those ancestral diets likely differed substantially over time and space, according to researchers at Georgia State University and Kent State University.

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Six official clay seals found by a Mississippi State University archaeological team at a small site in Israel offer evidence that supports the existence of biblical kings David and Solomon.

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important information about the period of David’s reign, based on new archaeological and epigraphic data unearthed in northwestern Syria and southern Turkey

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Vikings are known for raiding and trading, but those who settled in Iceland centuries ago spent more time producing and feasting on booze and beef — in part to gain political clout in a place very different from their homeland, says a Baylor archaeologist.

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In an extensive, multi-institution study led by SUNY Downstate Medical Center, researchers have identified new evidence supporting the growing belief that Neanderthals were a distinct species separate from modern humans (Homo sapiens), and not a subspecies of modern humans.

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A University of Utah study of two African tribes found evidence that men evolved better navigation ability than women because men with better spatial skills – the ability to mentally manipulate objects – can roam farther and have children with more mates.

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For 13 centuries, the Virupaksha Temple in Pattadakal has been one of the most recognizable landmarks in Indian art—a towering layer cake of elaborate, hand-carved friezes populated by a bevy of Hindu deities and symbols. Now Cathleen Cummings, Ph.D., an associate professor in the UAB Department of Art and Art History who specializes in Asian art history, has shown that these figures are more than just architectural decoration.

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Drought and overpopulation helped destroy Assyrian Empire, study says. Researchers see parallels with modern Syria and Iraq, and caution other regions also facing weather stresses.

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A new study by an international team of researchers that includes a Texas A&M University anthropologist shows that the modern European and East Asian populations were firmly established by 36,000 years ago, and that Neanderthal and modern human interbreeding occurred much earlier.

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When Yanomamö men in the Amazon raided villages and killed decades ago, they formed alliances with men in other villages rather than just with close kin like chimpanzees do. And the spoils of war came from marrying their allies’ sisters and daughters, rather than taking their victims’ land and women.

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During their last excavation season archeologists from the Institute of Archaeology at the University of Haifa found fascinating findings: In addition to a gold pendant, they found a large muscular marble leg and artillery ammunition from some 2,000 years ago. “The data is finally beginning to form a clear historical-archaeological picture,” said Dr. Michael Eisenberg, the dig director

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Recent studies showed that the color red tends increase our attraction toward others, feelings of jealousy, and even reaction times. Now, new research shows that female monkeys also respond to the color red, suggesting that biology, rather than our culture, may play the fundamental role in our “red” reactions.

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Derek Counts, professor and chair of the Department of Art History at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, is studying new ways of documenting and sharing artifacts.

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A University of Utah study of Africa’s Kalahari Bushmen suggests that stories told over firelight helped human culture and thought evolve by reinforcing social traditions, promoting harmony and equality, and sparking the imagination to envision a broad sense of community, both with distant people and the spirit world.

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Esta vasija de barro representa a un Hueheuteotl (“guey-guey-TE-oh-tul”), un dios mesoamericano personificado en la forma de un anciano y relacionado con el fuego.

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This clay vessel depicts a Hueheuteotl ("way-way-TAY-oh-tuhl"), a Mesoamerican deity represented as an old man and associated with fire.

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William Aylward, a University of Wisconsin-Madison professor of classics, recently completed a synthesis of the epic archaeological rescue excavation of Zeugma before its inundation beneath the waters of a reservoir. “Excavations at Zeugma,” the three-volume work edited by Aylward, gathers the descriptions and interpretations of nearly 30 scholars involved in either the rescue work or the decade-long analysis of the objects and buildings unearthed at the city.

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New studies of ancient DNA are shifting scientists' ideas of how groups of people migrated across the globe and interacted with one another thousands of years ago. By comparing nine ancient genomes to those of modern humans, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) scientists have shown that previously unrecognized groups contributed to the genetic mix now present in most modern-day Europeans.

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Ellen Miller didn’t hesitate to pay homage to a rock-and-roll legend when it came time to name a new fossil she surmised had large, sensitive lips.

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Researchers have created a data resource that will improve genomic research in the Ashkenazi Jewish population and lead to more effective personalized medicine. The team of experts from Columbia Engineering and 10 other labs in the NYC area and Israel focused on the Ashkenazi Jewish population because of its demographic history of genetic isolation and the resulting abundance of population-specific mutations and prevalence of rare genetic disorders. The study was published on Nature Communications.

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A copper awl, the oldest metal object found to date in the Middle East, was discovered during the excavations at Tel Tsaf.

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In an environment where others struggle to survive, Tibetans thrive in the thin air of the Tibetan Plateau, with an average elevation of 14,800 feet. A study led by University of Utah scientists is the first to find a genetic cause for the adaptation and demonstrate how it contributes to the Tibetans’ ability to live in low oxygen conditions. The work appears online in the journal Nature Genetics on Aug. 17, 2014.

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The sounds of a 7,000-year-old language now echo through the halls of the University of Kentucky. Professors and students work together to reconstruct a spoken version of PIE (Proto-Indo-European).

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Using a $1.5 million ion beam microscope, a team of Boise State University materials scientists is analyzing a nano-sized fragment from a Roman-Egyptian mummy portrait to help discover its provenance.

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During a four-year excavation of an Etruscan well at the ancient Italian settlement of Cetamura del Chianti, a team led by a Florida State University archaeologist and art historian unearthed artifacts spanning more than 15 centuries of Etruscan, Roman and medieval civilization in Tuscany.

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Countless lives have been lost due to civil wars, political instability, and conflict in the Middle East. While the world's attention is quite naturally focused on the human toll, the destruction of cultural heritage goes largely unreported.

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A study of 1,400 ancient and modern human skulls suggests that a reduction in testosterone hormone levels accompanied the development of cooperation, complex communication and modern culture some 50,000 years ago.

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Your teeth can tell stories about you, and not just that you always forget to floss.

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A large brain, long legs, the ability to craft tools and prolonged maturation periods were all thought to have evolved together at the start of the Homo lineage as African grasslands expanded and Earth’s climate became cooler and drier. However, new climate and fossil evidence analyzed by a team of researchers suggests that these traits did not arise as a single package. Rather, several key ingredients once thought to define Homo evolved in earlier Australopithecus ancestors between 3 and 4 million years ago, while others emerged significantly later.

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Figuring out how to survive on a lean-season diet of hard-to-reach ants, slugs and other bugs may have spurred the development of bigger brains and higher-level cognitive functions in the ancestors of humans and other primates, suggests research from Washington University in St. Louis.

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The popular idea that Northern Europeans developed light skin to absorb more UV light so they could make more vitamin D – vital for healthy bones and immune function – is questioned by UC San Francisco researchers in a new study published online in the journal Evolutionary Biology.

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Old World monkeys have undergone a remarkable evolution in facial appearance as a way of avoiding interbreeding with closely related and geographically proximate species, researchers from NYU and the University of Exeter have found. Their research provides the best evidence to date for the role of visual cues as a barrier to breeding across species.

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Covert changes of mind can be discovered by tracking neural activity when subjects make decisions, researchers from New York University and Stanford University have found. Their results, offer new insights into how we make decisions and point to innovative ways to study this process in the future.

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A widespread pattern of human-caused environmental degradation and related flood-mitigation efforts began changing the natural flow of China’s Yellow River nearly 3,000 years ago, setting the stage for massive floods that toppled the Western Han Dynasty, suggests new research from Washington University in St. Louis.

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Millions of ancient looted coins from archaeological excavations enter the black market yearly, and a Baylor University researcher who has seen plundered sites likens the thefts to stealing “smoking guns” from crime scenes. But those who collect and study coins have been far too reluctant to condemn the unregulated trade, he says.

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The findings in the paper, titled “Protective buttressing of the hominin face,” present an alternative to the previous long-held hypothesis that the evolution of the robust faces of our early ancestors resulted largely from the need to chew hard-to-crush foods such as nuts.

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Smithsonian curator Antonio Curet studies the vast collections from Latin America and the Caribbean at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian to develop exhibits that tell the rich histories of these indigenous cultures. He talks about his work in this short video profile.

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Antonio Curet estudia las amplias colecciones de objetos provenientes de Latinoamérica y el Caribe en el Museo Nacional del Indígena Americano del Smithsonian, para desarrollar exposiciones que cuentan la historia de estas culturas indígenas.

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A single-letter change in the genetic code is enough to generate blond hair in humans, in dramatic contrast to our dark-haired ancestors. A new analysis by Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) scientists has pinpointed that change, which is common in the genomes of Northern Europeans, and shown how it fine-tunes the regulation of an essential gene.

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A new study released May 7 in the journal PLOS ONE suggests that people who survived the medieval mass-killing plague known as the Black Death lived significantly longer and were healthier than people who lived before the epidemic struck in 1347. University of South Carolina researcher Sharon DeWitte's findings have important implications for understanding emerging diseases and how they impact the health of individuals and populations of people.

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Using thermal imagery, researchers can now see what lies beneath the dirt-covered desert landscape. A team of researchers from the University of North Florida and the University of Arkansas have successfully used drones to unearth a 1,000-year-old village in northwestern New Mexico, revealing never-seen-before structures, unique insight into who lived there and what the area was like.

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The Peking Man site at Zhoukoudian and the fossil remains uncovered there continue to be a source of evolutionary fascination. The disappearance of these fossils en route from China to the American Museum of Natural History in 1941 has added to the mystery. While China’s contribution to our understanding of primate and human evolution has grown immeasurably since that time and is now far greater than Peking Man, the historical and scientific importance of the Zhoudoudian site, fossils and artifacts is extraordinary.

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Studies by researchers at Arizona State University and University of Chicago uncovered clues to how past peoples moved across their landscape as the once lush environment deteriorated.

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Technical objections to the idea that Neandertals interbred with the ancestors of Eurasians have been overcome, thanks to a genome analysis method described in the April 2014 issue of the journal GENETICS (http://www.genetics.org). The technique can more confidently detect the genetic signatures of interbreeding than previous approaches and will be useful for evolutionary studies of other ancient or rare DNA samples.

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An analysis led by the Santa Fe Institute's Marcus Hamilton paints a grim picture of the experiences of indigenous societies following contact with Western Europeans, but also offers hope to those seeking to preserve Brazil’s remaining indigenous societies.

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Charred grains of barley, millet and wheat deposited nearly 5,000 years ago at campsites in the high plains of Kazakhstan show that nomadic sheepherders played a surprisingly important role in the early spread of domesticated crops throughout a mountainous east-west corridor along the historic Silk Road, suggests new research from Washington University in St. Louis.