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When Chauvet Cave artists created their artwork, the Pont d’Arc was already there

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The Chauvet Cave, which lies by the entrance to the Gorges of the Ardèche, is home to the world’s oldest cave paintings, dating back 36,000 years.

Their state of preservation and aesthetic qualities earned them a spot on the World Heritage List in 2014, 20 years after their discovery.

The location of the cavern – surrounded by a remarkable landscape, next to the Pont d’Arc natural archway – raises the question of whether the people who executed these artworks looked and walked out upon the same landscape as today. [Read more…] about When Chauvet Cave artists created their artwork, the Pont d’Arc was already there

3,500 year-old honeypot: Oldest direct evidence for honey collecting in Africa

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Honey is humankind’s oldest sweetener – and for thousands of years it was also the only one. Indirect clues about the significance of bees and bee products are provided by prehistoric petroglyphs on various continents, created between 8,000 and 40,000 years ago. Ancient Egyptian reliefs indicate the practice of beekeeping as early as 2600 year BCE. But for sub-Saharan Africa, direct archaeological evidence has been lacking until now.

The analysis of the chemical residues of food in potsherds has fundamentally altered the picture. Archaeologists at Goethe University in cooperation with chemists at the University of Bristol were able to identify beeswax residues in 3500 year-old potsherds of the Nok culture.

The Nok culture in central Nigeria dates between 1500 BCE and the beginning of the Common Era and is known particularly for its elaborate terracotta sculptures. These sculptures represent the oldest figurative art in Africa. Until a few years ago, the social context in which these sculptures had been created was completely unknown. [Read more…] about 3,500 year-old honeypot: Oldest direct evidence for honey collecting in Africa

Neanderthal ancestry identifies oldest modern human genome

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Ancient DNA from Neandertals and early modern humans has recently shown that the groups likely interbred somewhere in the Near East after modern humans left Africa some 50,000 years ago. As a result, all people outside Africa carry around 2% to 3% Neandertal DNA.

In modern human genomes, those Neandertal DNA segments became increasingly shorter over time and their length can be used to estimate when an individual lived.

Archaeological data published last year furthermore suggests that modern humans were already present in southeastern Europe 47-43,000 years ago, but due to a scarcity of fairly complete human fossils and the lack of genomic DNA, there is little understanding of who these early human colonists were – or of their relationships to ancient and present-day human groups. [Read more…] about Neanderthal ancestry identifies oldest modern human genome

New deadly snake from Asia named after character from Chinese myth ‘Legend of White Snake’

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In 2001, the famous herpetologist Joseph B. Slowinski died from snakebite by an immature black-and-white banded krait, while leading an expedition team in northern Myanmar.

The very krait that caused his death is now confirmed to belong to the same species identified as a new to science venomous snake, following an examination of samples collected between 2016 and 2019 from Yingjiang County, Yunnan Province, China.

The new krait species, found in Southwestern China and Northern Myanmar, is described by Dr Zening Chen of Guangxi Normal University, PhD candidate Shengchao Shi, Dr Li Ding from the Chengdu Institute of Biology at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dr Gernot Vogel of the Society for Southeast Asian Herpetology in Germany and Dr Jingsong Shi of the Institute of Vertebrate Paleontology and Paleoanthropology at Chinese Academy of Sciences. [Read more…] about New deadly snake from Asia named after character from Chinese myth ‘Legend of White Snake’

New study identifies Neanderthal ancestry in African populations and describes its origin

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When the first Neanderthal genome was sequenced, using DNA collected from ancient bones, it was accompanied by the discovery that modern humans in Asia, Europe and America inherited approximately 2 percent of their DNA from Neanderthals – proving humans and Neanderthals had interbred after humans left Africa.

Since that study, new methods have continued to catalogue Neanderthal ancestry in non-African populations, seeking to better understand human history and the effects of Neanderthal DNA on human health and disease.

A comparable catalogue of Neanderthal ancestry in African populations, however, has remained an acknowledged blind spot for the field due to technical constraints and the assumption that Neanderthals and ancestral African populations were geographically isolated from each other. [Read more…] about New study identifies Neanderthal ancestry in African populations and describes its origin

World’s first dinosaur preserved sitting on nest of eggs with fossilized babies

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The fossil in question is that of an oviraptorosaur, a group of bird-like theropod dinosaurs that thrived during the Cretaceous Period, the third and final time period of the Mesozoic Era (commonly known as the ‘Age of Dinosaurs’) that extended from 145 to 66 million years ago.

The new specimen was recovered from uppermost Cretaceous-aged rocks, some 70 million years old, in Ganzhou City in southern China’s Jiangxi Province.

“Dinosaurs preserved on their nests are rare, and so are fossil embryos. This is the first time a non-avian dinosaur has been found, sitting on a nest of eggs that preserve embryos, in a single spectacular specimen,” explains Dr. Shundong Bi. [Read more…] about World’s first dinosaur preserved sitting on nest of eggs with fossilized babies

Ancient structures were part of a giant, global ‘macrocomputer’, says researcher

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Many ancient megalithic structures were “macrocomputers”, and part of a global energy grid which provided free electricity worldwide, according to scientist Michael Tellinger.

The popular alternative historian and archaeologist says one of the most spectacular signs of ancient scientific knowledge and intelligence  is the fact that all the megalithic structures still remain standing on Earth thousands of years after they were built.

Moreover, most of them have a precise shape, structure and arrangement similar to what can be found inside modern computers. [Read more…] about Ancient structures were part of a giant, global ‘macrocomputer’, says researcher

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    Mysterious monolith appears around the worldA mysterious monolith (main picture) has been appearing in remote locations around the world since November last year, without any explanation as to what they are supposed to signify.  Clearly modern in its construction, the metal monolith – which looks vaguely like an obelisk – was first spotted on 18th…
    Tags: structures, years, megalithic, stone, earth, scientific, ancient, features, archaeology

Mysterious monolith appears around the world

by

A mysterious monolith (main picture) has been appearing in remote locations around the world since November last year, without any explanation as to what they are supposed to signify. 

Clearly modern in its construction, the metal monolith – which looks vaguely like an obelisk – was first spotted on 18th November in the desert in Utah, in the US. Then it disappeared about 10 days later.

After disappearing from Utah, it has reappeared in various locations including Belgium, the UK and Romania. [Read more…] about Mysterious monolith appears around the world

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  • Ancient structures were part of a giant, global ‘macrocomputer’, says researcher
    41
    Ancient structures were part of a giant, global ‘macrocomputer’, says researcherMany ancient megalithic structures were “macrocomputers”, and part of a global energy grid which provided free electricity worldwide, according to scientist Michael Tellinger. The popular alternative historian and archaeologist says one of the most spectacular signs of ancient scientific knowledge and intelligence  is the fact that all the megalithic structures…
    Tags: structures, ancient, megalithic, earth, years, stone, scientific, features, archaeology

Ancient Maya built sophisticated water filters

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Ancient Maya in the once-bustling city of Tikal built sophisticated water filters using natural materials they imported from miles away, according to the University of Cincinnati.

UC researchers discovered evidence of a filter system at the Corriental reservoir, an important source of drinking water for the ancient Maya in what is now northern Guatemala.

A multidisciplinary team of UC anthropologists, geographers and biologists identified crystalline quartz and zeolite imported miles from the city. The quartz found in the coarse sand along with zeolite, a crystalline compound consisting of silicon and aluminum, create a natural molecular sieve. Both minerals are used in modern water filtration. [Read more…] about Ancient Maya built sophisticated water filters

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    A tangled food web: Maximizing production with efficient inputsBorn in food web ecology, the concept of trophic levels – the hierarchy of who eats who in the natural world – is an elegant way to understand how biomass and energy move through a natural system. It's only natural that the idea found its way into the realm of…
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