In their day, the Assyrians were one of the greatest superpowers in the Middle East, controlling a landmass that stretched from Iran to Egypt. They accomplished this feat with military technologies that helped them win any open-air battle or penetrate any fortified city. While airpower and bunker h
Talking about cities in the Stone Age seems like an oxymoron. But up to 10,000 people lived in Çatalhöyük, in Turkey, about 8,000-9,000 years ago. This makes it the largest known settlement from what archaeologists call the Neolithic and Chalcolithic periods. Lise Bender Jørgensen is an archaeologi
Next to the village of Assento in the council of Vila Real, in the north of Portugal, there is a curious rocky enclosure in which several cavities of different sizes are carved. Although at first glance some of them may seem natural, they are actually part of a Roman sanctuary built between the end
Archaeologists from the University of Münster and the National Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Armenia have discovered remains of a Roman arched aqueduct during excavation work at the Hellenistic royal city of Artaxata in ancient Armenia. It is the easternmost arched aqueduct of the Roman Emp
During recent excavations northeast of Cairo, an Egyptian-German team of archaeologists has found important evidence of the history of the temple city of Heliopolis. Among the objects discovered, dating from different millennia, are reliefs and inscriptions on basalt blocks belonging to the north an
Near the Italian town of Foresta in the province of Caserta, and very close to the extinct volcano Roccamonfina, there is an area called Ciampate del Diavolo (literally footprints of the devil ). It is named like this due to a trail of fossilized footprints, divided into three sections, clearly visi
The ancient Maya had stone temples and palaces in the Central American rainforest, along with dynastic records of royal leaders carved in stone, but they lacked an essential staple for daily life:salt. Sources of salt are found primarily along the coast, including salt flats on the Yucatan coast an
Although most will identify the name Imhotep with the evil antagonist of the two The Mummy films (1932 and 1999), is actually written in gold letters in the history of art for having created the famous stepped pyramid for Pharaoh Zóser, which was the first great funerary monument and laid the founda
Members of the Don expedition of the Russian Archaeological Institute have found a unique plaque with a depiction of winged Scythian gods around griffins during their examinations of the Devitsa V tomb site in the Ostrogozhsky district of the Voronezh region. This is the first case of this type of f
The sibyls, in Greek and Roman mythology, were women capable of predicting the future, named after the first of them all, a young woman (daughter of Dardanus and Neso) who prophesied the Trojan War. She was in Delphi before the existence of the Pythia oracle and the sanctuary of Apollo, and her ori
Archaeologists working at the prehistoric site of Ebreichsdorf, in Austria, found hundreds of gold objects, among which a kind of bowl decorated with solar motifs stands out. This is the first such find in Austria, adding to more than 30 similar bowls found elsewhere in Europe, such as Spain, Franc
Many of the calendars we use today have printed the national holidays of the country, region or autonomous community, days designated as non-working days, and in the case of religious calendars, saints and holidays associated with worship. In ancient Rome they also had this type of calendars, which
In 2020 the Polish Center for Mediterranean Archeology at the University of Warsaw joined forces with Lebanese and Spanish colleagues who had been investigating the Tire site since 1997 to form the Spanish-Polish-Lebanese Archaeological Expedition in Tyre. The expedition is jointly led by Professor
Since the end of the 18th century, numerous travelers have left in writing mentions and brief descriptions of some curious dolmens scattered on both sides of the Caucasus mountain range, on its western slope, between Abkhazia and the Tamán peninsula. But it would not be until the end of the 19th ce
Over time the concrete cracks and crumbles. Well, most concrete cracks and crumbles. Structures built in ancient Rome still stand, displaying remarkable durability despite conditions that would devastate modern concrete. The construction of this innovative and robust monument and landmark on the
The oldest known footprints of early hominins were found on the Mediterranean island of Crete and are at least six million years old, says an international team of researchers from Germany, Sweden, Greece, Egypt and England, led by scientists Uwe Kirscher. and Madelaine Böhme, from the Senckenberg C
Human feces do not usually remain for a long time, and even less so for thousands of years. But there are exceptions to this general rule in some places around the world, such as the prehistoric salt mines of Hallstatt-Dachstein/Salzkammergut, an Austrian UNESCO World Heritage Site. Now, researcher
In 1850 the French Auguste Mariette, interested in the study of Egyptian hieroglyphics and the Coptic language, was commissioned by the Louvre Museum to travel to Egypt in search of Coptic, Syriac and Arabic manuscripts. He was to buy as many as he could find, to maintain the primacy of the Parisian
The Vikings traveled great distances in their iconic ships. To the west, they established settlements in Iceland, Greenland, and eventually a base at LAnse aux Meadows, Newfoundland, Canada. However, it is not clear when this first transatlantic activity took place. In this case, scientists show th
In 1975, a fishing boat working in the sea off the southwestern Korean peninsula, near the Shinan Islands, caught six pieces of Chinese pottery in its nets. This seemingly trivial incident led to the discovery of a 14th-century shipwreck with a valuable cargo of pottery and other artifacts. Much of
After a month of exploring Regio V, a new study area, the site of Pompeii reveals new treasures. Detail of a fresco recently appeared on the wall of an unknown domus excavated in Regio V of the site of Pompeii (Italy). The grill of a window submerged for 2000 years under the lapilli, frescoes of
The citadel of Amman, the Jordanian capital, is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, at least since about 7000 BC. Circa 1200 B.C. It was already called Rabbat-Amón (from which its current name derives), the main city of the Ammonites, a Semitic tribe of which there are abun
Caesar and his legions attempted to invade Britain twice as early as 55 BCE. One such landing site has been discovered in Kent. Marble bas-relief by John Deare (1759-1798) illustrating the attempted invasion of England by Jules Cesar. He came, he saw… he left… Iron weapons and Roman javelins, rec
Another interesting archaeological discovery was made there around from Omsk, Siberia. It is an armor made of bones. The artifact is, according to estimates, between 3,500 and 3,900 years old and was actually found in an excavation of a construction site for a future hotel on the banks of the Irtysh