Lost Photos Suggest Europeans Were Mummifying Their Dead Far Earlier Than We Thought

Archaeologists may have just uncovered evidence for the oldest known practice of mummification. Human remains interred 8,000 years ago in the Sado Valley in Portugal, during the Mesolithic, appear to have been deliberately treated for mummification prior to burial. This is the first evidence for Mesolithic mummification in Europe.   It’s also possibly the oldest … Read more

Mysterious Headless Horse Skeleton Found Buried in Medieval Graveyard

The skeletal remains of a man buried 1,400 years ago near a headless horse have been discovered at an ancient cemetery in the town of Knittlingen in southern Germany. He likely was the horse’s owner/rider when he was alive.   The man was buried at a time when the Merovingian dynasty (476–750 CE) flourished in … Read more

Archeology: Hybrid animal in 4500-year-old tomb is earliest known bred by humans

Early Bronze Age people in Syria crossed donkeys with wild asses to make prized horse-like hybrids, demonstrating advanced understanding of animal breeding Life 14 January 2022 By Alice Klein Equid skeletons from Tell Umm el-Marra, Syria Glenn Schwartz/John Hopkins University The bones of horse-like creatures unearthed in a 4500-year-old royal tomb in Syria are the … Read more

Dinosaur discovery: 70 million-year-old embryo found exquisitely preserved inside its egg

A 70 million-year-old oviraptorosaur egg that had been forgotten in a Chinese museum storeroom contains the most well-preserved dinosaur embryo ever discovered Life 21 December 2021 By Alice Klein The fossilised oviraptorosaur dinosaur embryo curled up in its egg Xing et al., 2021 A fossilised dinosaur embryo discovered in southern China may be the most … Read more

Adorned 10,000-Year-Old Burial Suggests Even Infant Females Were Mourned as ‘People’

The remains of an ancient female child, no more than two months of age, have been found lavishly decorated with pendants and beads in northwest Italy. The precious skeleton was discovered in the Arma Veirana cave in 2017 and has now been dated to about 10,000 old. This time is known as the early Holocene, … Read more

Archaeologists Found a Truly Bizarre Burial in an Isolated Medieval Graveyard

A three-week archaeological dig in the English Channel took a bizarre, inexplicable turn, after researchers chanced upon a carefully cut grave hidden in the soil – the contents of which were definitely not human.   The discovery, made on the small island of Chapelle Dom Hue off the coast of Guernsey in September 2017, revealed … Read more