World News
Visiting the Kingdom of Ife at the British Museum
When Nigeria appears on the news, it is too often for internet scams or identity fraud perpetrated on unsuspecting victims thousands of miles away. But the new exhibition at the British Museum brings to the public a very different side to Nigerian culture: the Kingdom of Ife.
Death Underground: Gas warfare at Dura-Europos
Interwar excavators found the remains of about 20 Roman soldiers in an ancient siege tunnel beneath the walls of the Syrian fortress-city of Dura-Europos. No-one was sure how they had died. Now, archaeologist Simon James has pieced together the forensic evidence for the world’s first poison-gas attack.
Caribbean Treasures: Digging forgotten lives on Carriacou
Carriacou is a quiet island idyll in the southern Caribbean. Prior to the arrival of Europeans, this was an archetypal deserted island. Or so it seemed. Now, archaeologists are revealing a vibrant picture of its pre-European life, as Scott Fitzpatrick explains.
Portus – world wonder
An amphitheatre, with a footprint to match the Pantheon in Rome, has been discovered at the 2nd century man-made harbour of Portus, Rome’s ‘gateway to the Mediterranean’.
Gold Fever: the tombs fo the Lords of Sipán
In 1987, some of the world‘s richest and most extraordinary tombs were found on the North coast of Peru. They were left by the people of the Moche culture, who preceded the Inca by some 1,000 years. To this day, the site continues to yield great wonders. The editor Nadia Durrani went to Peru to [...]
Gold Fever: the tombs fo the Lords of Sipán
In 1987, some of the world‘s richest and most extraordinary tombs were found on the North coast of Peru. They were left by the people of the Moche culture, who preceded the Inca by some 1,000 years. To this day, the site continues to yield great wonders. The editor Nadia Durrani went to Peru to [...]
Astroarchaeology: Lost in Space
Space, the final archaeological frontier? Following NASA’s recent Golden Anniversary celebrations, David Miles looks to the skies for extra-terrestrial archaeology. Archaeology, like the Universe, keeps expanding. In the late 1960s pessimists foretold archaeology’s total destruction: sites ripped apart, scattered and buried by humanity careless of its own past. In fact, the evidence of our past [...]
Superburials: Thailand’s Bronze Age
The archaeologists had reached the site’s natural sandy substrate – the site was finished and their work was done. Then they noticed a surprise pot and then another pot. Then, before them, an entire, highly unusual cemetery unfolded. Site director Charles Higham reveals the latest findings from Ban Non Wat.
Desert island digs: Excavating the real Robinson Crusoe
It was not much: two simple hearths, three small postholes, and a fragment of pointed bronze. But it was found on Robinson Crusoe Island. And it was almost certainly the hut of the world-famous castaway. Excavators Daisuke Takahashi and David Caldwell report.
In the Land of Lincoln: Log cabin archaeology
The life of Abraham Lincoln has always aroused passionate interest in the United States, but with 2009 as the bicentennial celebration of his birth, excitement is gathering at an even faster pace. Some 300 biographies of Lincoln are already on the market, with more to come, along with a Stephen Spielberg cinema biography starring Liam [...]
