Huge Settlement Unearthed At Stonehenge Complex

Excavations supported by National Geographic at Durrington Walls in the Stonehenge World Heritage site have revealed an enormous ancient settlement that once housed hundreds of people. Archaeologists believe the houses were constructed and occupied by the builders of nearby Stonehenge, the legendary monument on England's Salisbury Plain.

"English Heritage's magnetometry survey had detected dozens of hearths -- the whole valley appears full of houses," said archaeologist Mike Parker Pearson of the U.K.'s Sheffield University. "In what were houses, we have excavated the outlines on the floors of box beds and wooden dressers or cupboards."

The houses have been radiocarbon dated to 2600-2500 B.C., the same period Stonehenge was built -- one of the facts that leads the archaeologists to conclude that the people who lived in the Durrington Walls houses were responsible for constructing Stonehenge. The houses form the largest Neolithic village ever found in Britain; a few similar Neolithic houses have been found in the Orkney Islands off Scotland.

Parker Pearson said the discoveries this season help confirm a theory that Stonehenge did not stand in isolation but was part of a much larger religious complex used for funerary ritual.

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Not in the stars for Stonehenge?

The discovery of a large, prehistoric settlement 2 miles from Stonehenge suggests that the famous stone rings were an ancient memorial, not a Stone Age observatory, archaeologists said Tuesday.
A community of hundreds of people lived there about 2500 B.C., during the time Stonehenge was erected, say the scientists, led by Mike Parker Pearson of the United Kingdom's Sheffield University. Inhabitants most likely raised Stonehenge as a monument to their dead, who were buried there ceremonially.

Stonehenge, a double horseshoe of towering stones near Wiltshire, England, has fascinated people since the Middle Ages. It has figured in numerous debates, both scholarly and whimsical, over its origins. It has been called a prehistoric observatory, an ancient house of worship, even a creation of aliens.

The community was found within the confines of Durrington Walls, a 1,400-foot-wide henge, or a circular flat area, surrounded by a ditch and an earthen bank. Durrington Walls was discovered in the 1960s, and archaeological detective work has continued over the years.

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Unearthed: The wild town next to Stonehenge where the builders partied like it was 2500 BC

By any standards, it was a wild party: piles of half-eaten pig bones were flung to the floor by revellers who then smashed their food bowls into a "filthy" mud floor.

Add to that the fact that this bash took place 4,600 years ago, less than two miles from Stonehenge, and the result is a dramatic step forward in the quest to trace the origins - and purpose - of the world's most famous standing stones.

Archaeologists have revealed the discovery of a huge ancient settlement in Wiltshire used by the builders of Stonehenge and their descendants to celebrate life and death with lavish feasts of freshly slaughtered livestock.

Excavations at Durrington Walls, situated to the north-east of Stonehenge, have uncovered the largest Neolithic village in Britain.

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Timber shrine reveals Stonehenge secret

New excavations near Stonehenge could finally explain its reason for existence: as one half of a much larger temple built to celebrate the living and the dead.

A dig less than two miles away has revealed the largest neolithic village in Britain. The similar dates and designs of the sites have convinced archaeologists that they were elements of a single religious complex.

Stonehenge was designed as a permanent monument to the dead and constructed of rock to symbolise their enduring presence, the research suggests.

The nearby settlement at Durrington Walls was a shrine to the transience of life. Its houses were made of wood, as was a timber circle mirroring the design of Stonehenge.

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Village of Stonehenge builders uncovered

Archaeologists who have unearthed the largest Neolithic village found in Britain believe it housed hundreds of workers who helped build Stonehenge.

The discovery of the settlement, along with tools, pottery and food debris, will help solve some of the remaining mysteries surrounding the country's most significant prehistoric monument and show how people lived 4,500 years ago.

Nine houses have been excavated at Durrington Walls, a huge circular earthwork less than two miles from Stonehenge.

Signs of dozens more clay hearths set in more houses have been identified through magnetic field analysis beneath the 1,400ft-wide enclosure. Researchers believe it was a base for seasonal workers and a festival venue for midwinter solstice celebrations.

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Ancient homes found in road dig

Ancient settlements from Roman times and the Iron Age have been found by the side of a major road development.

Archaeologists were called in to survey the A66 in North Yorkshire to ensure nothing valuable would be destroyed.

Their work has now uncovered the remains of a roundhouse, square buildings, ditches and pits by the Melsonby crossroads, by Scotch Corner.

The finds are thought to link to a larger settlement which would have been on the other side of the road.

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Anthropologist Confirms ‘Hobbit’ Indeed a Separate Species

After the skeletal remains of an 18,000-year-old, Hobbit-sized human were discovered on the Indonesian island of Flores in 2003, some scientists thought that the specimen must have been a pygmy or a microcephalic — a human with an abnormally small skull.

Not so, said Dean Falk, a world-renowned paleoneurologist and chair of Florida State University’s anthropology department, who along with an international team of experts created detailed maps of imprints left on the ancient hominid’s braincase and concluded that the so-called Hobbit was actually a new species closely related to Homo sapiens.

Now after further study, Falk is absolutely convinced that her team was right and that the species cataloged as LB1, Homo floresiensis, is definitely not a human born with microcephalia — a somewhat rare pathological condition that still occurs today. Usually the result of a double-recessive gene, the condition is characterized by a small head and accompanied by some mental retardation.

“We have answered the people who contend that the Hobbit is a microcephalic,” Falk said of her team’s study of both normal and microcephalic human brains published in the Jan. 29 issue of the journal PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States).

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'Hobbit' human 'is a new species'

The tiny skeletal remains of human "Hobbits" found on an Indonesian island belong to a completely new branch of our family tree, a study has found.

The finds caused a sensation when they were announced to the world in 2004.

But some researchers argued the bones belonged to a modern human with a combination of small stature and a brain disorder called microcephaly.

That claim is rejected by the latest study, which compares the tiny people with modern microcephalics.

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Stonehenge builders' houses found

A huge ancient settlement used by the people who built Stonehenge has been found, archaeologists have said.

Excavations at Durrington Walls, near the legendary Salisbury Plain monument, uncovered remains of ancient houses.

People seem to have occupied the sites seasonally, using them for ritual feasting and funeral ceremonies.

In ancient times, this settlement would have housed hundreds of people, making it the largest Neolithic village ever found in Britain.

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Home of Stonehenge builders found

A small village has been found by scientists in the United Kingdom at the Durrington Walls that is believed to have belonged to those who built Stonehenge. This is the largest Neolithic settlement to ever be discovered in the U.K., having beleived to house over 100 people.

Scientists say that the village was built around 2,600 B.C. which is roughly when Stonehenge was believed to have been construced.

Inside the areas which would have been the interior of houses at the time, scientists also found "bed" and "cuppard or dresser" outlines. Pieces of pottery and "filthy" rubbish around the site. Animal bones were also uncovered. Arrowheads, stone tools and other relics were also discovered.

"We've never seen such quantities of pottery and animal bone and flint. In what were houses, we have excavated the outlines on the floors of box beds and wooden dressers or cupboards," said Sheffield University archaeologist, Mike Parker Pearson.

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Remains of Village Found Near Stonehenge

A village of small houses that may have sheltered the builders of the mysterious Stonehenge, or people attending festivals there, has been found by archaeologists studying the stone circle in England. Eight of the houses, with central hearths, have been excavated, and there may be as many as 25 of them, Mike Parker Pearson said Tuesday at a briefing organized by the National Geographic Society.

The ancient houses are at a site known as Durrington Walls, about two miles from Stonehenge. It is also the location of a wooden version of the stone circle.

The village was carbon dated to about 2600 B.C., about the same time Stonehenge was built. The Great Pyramid in Egypt was built at about the same time, said Parker Pearson of Sheffield University.

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Irish river find may be first discovery of Viking ship

An ancient boat discovered in a riverbed north of Dublin may be the first Viking longship found in the country, Environment and Heritage Minister Dick Roche said.

The wreck in the River Boyne, close to the northeastern port of Drogheda, was described by Roche as potentially an "enormously exciting discovery".

The vessel, nine metres (30 feet) wide by 16 metres long, was discovered accidentally during dredging operations last November but the find was not made public until now.

"It is described as clinker built, a shipbuilding technology dating from the Viking era but also still in use centuries later," Roche said.

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Private archaeological collection donated to Heritage Malta

Heritage Malta has received a donation of over 300 Punic and Phoenician artefacts which will enrich the national collection. A selection of these artefacts is being exhibited at the National Museum of Archaeology, Valletta. The collection was donated by Chev. Joseph Sammut who inherited them from his late grandfather Ganni Sammut in 1958.

Ganni Sammut was born in 1881; he was a blacksmith of humble origins but with a keen interest in Malta’s history coupled with an inherent talent in identifying and selecting artefacts of intrinsic value.

The majority of this collection is made up of business gifts from local contractors which they found while digging the foundations of various buildings in the early 20th century. Another source of acquisition was direct purchase from local auctions. Ganni Sammut sometimes purchased items to prevent such artefacts being acquired by foreigners and hence being exported from Malta. He never sold any artefact, and the collection remained complete.

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Mitteldeutscher Archäologiepreis

Wer sich mit der Archäologie Mitteldeutschlands beschäftigt, kann sich jetzt an der Ausschreibung des Mitteldeutschen Archäologiepreises beteiligen - Einsendeschluss ist der 15. Februar.

Der mit 5.000 € dotierte Mitteldeutsche Archäologiepreis geht an Personen oder­ Forscher­gruppen, die sich in besonderem Maße um die Archäologie Mitteldeutschlands verdient gemacht haben.

Berücksichtigt werden hervorragende wissenschaftliche Leistungen - Magister- bzw. Diplomarbeiten, Dissertationen, Habilitationsschriften, Forschungsstudien oder inter­disziplinäre Untersuchungen - sowie sonstige herausragende Verdienste für die Archäologie Mitteldeutschlands.

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Paleontologists Discover Most Primitive Primate Skeleton

The origins and earliest branches of primate evolution are clearer and more ancient by 10 million years than previous studies estimated, according to a study featured on the cover of the Jan. 23 print edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The paper by researchers at Yale, the University of Winnipeg, Stony Brook University, and led by University of Florida paleontologist Jonathan Bloch reconstructs the base of the primate family tree by comparing skeletal and fossil specimens representing more than 85 modern and extinct species. The team also discovered two 56-million-year-old fossils, including the most primitive primate skeleton ever described.

In the two-part study, an extensive evaluation of skeletal structures provides evidence that plesiadapiforms, a group of archaic mammals once thought to be more closely related to flying lemurs, are the most primitive primates. The team analyzed 173 characteristics of modern primates, tree shrews, flying lemurs with plesiadapiform skeletons to determine their evolutionary relationships. High-resolution CT scanning made fine resolution of inaccessible structures inside the skulls possible.

"This is the first study to bring it all together," said co-author Eric Sargis, associate professor of anthropology at Yale University and Assistant Curator of Vertebrate Zoology at Yale's Peabody Museum of Natural History. "The extensive dataset, the number and type of characteristics we were able to compare, and the availability of full skeletons, let us test far more than any previous study."

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Ancient Turkish site set to be flooded

The Allianoi archaeological site could soon be under water if authorities carry out their plans to flood a newly constructed reservoir. Located in western Turkey, the site is a well-preserved example of an ancient Roman health spa.

Archaeologist Ahmet Yaras, head of the Allianoi excavation team, is spearheading a campaign to save the site from being submerged. They are trying to rally international support to pressure the authorities to move the reservoir — or at least delay the flooding for another five years so that they can finish the excavations.

Allianoi is a hot-springs area 18 kilometres northeast of the ruins of ancient Pergamon that was used as a spa in Hellenistic times. It was constructed during major public works done under the reign of the Roman emperor Hadrian during the second century AD. In addition to the spa, the Allianoi site includes public squares, streets, gates, bridges, fountains and buildings. Together, they encompass about 50,000 square metres, and they could all end up in the middle of the reservoir.

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ARCHAEOLOGICAL FINDS GO ON SHOW AT MELTON CARNEGIE MUSEUM

Melton Carnegie Museum in Leicester is hosting an exhibition that showcases many of the rare archaeological artefacts unearthed by local residents.

The exhibition, Found in Leicestershire, runs until 23 March 2007 and features an array of exciting finds including a wonderful collection of Roman brooches, a rare prehistoric flint dagger, Viking age objects and many medieval items, all from the Melton area.

The display tells the story of everyday life for our ancestors and gives a compelling picture of our past. The finds also include an assortment of domestic items made of metal, stone and pottery, whilst accompanying literature reveals their historical importance and how they were found.

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Normandy grave hints at 300-year defiance of the Roman Empire

A macabre 1,700-year-old mass grave of people and horses, discovered in Normandy, poses perplexing new questions about the Roman conquest of France. Was there a small part of ancient Gaul which refused, Asterix-like, to surrender for 300 years?

The grave site, from the 3rd century, which was discovered by French state archaeologists at Evreux, appears to contain ritual arrangements of human and horse remains. In one, a human skull is clasped between two horse's skulls, like the two halves of a giant shell.

In Gaullish times, 300 years earlier, graves containing both horses and people were common. No such grave has ever been found from the Roman period, and even in the previous era, the remains were kept carefully apart.

In the recently discovered grave, about 50 miles west of Paris, the bones appear to have been intentionally mixed. The skeletons of 40 people and 100 horses have been found so far.

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Sacred Cave of Rome's Founders Discovered, Archaeologists Say

Archaeologists say they have unearthed Lupercale—the sacred cave where, according to legend, a she-wolf nursed the twin founders of Rome and where the city itself was born.

The long-lost underground chamber was found beneath the remains of Emperor Augustus' palace on the Palatine, a 230-foot-tall (70-meter-tall) hill in the center of the city.

Archaeologists from the Department of Cultural Heritage of the Rome Municipality came across the 50-foot-deep (15-meter-deep) cavity while working to restore the decaying palace.

"We were drilling the ground near Augustus' residence to survey the foundations of the building when we discovered the cave," said Irene Iacopi, the archaeologist in charge of the area.

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Archaeology checks for developers

Developers building in areas of historic interest in Jersey will have to pay archaeologists to oversee their foundation work under new laws.

The planning guidelines were drawn up to protect sites of potential archaeological importance.

The guidelines will be enforced on large building developments but on private projects, the government will foot the archaeologists' bills.

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