Portage: Will archeologists find proof of Viking ship-hauling in Scotland?

When, in season four of the hit television series Vikings, Ragnar Lothbrok exhorts his fellow Norsemen to pull their ships out of the water and over the hills to attack Paris, it seems like an impossible feat – made for TV. 

Certain written records, however, suggest that the act of dragging a ship across land – known as portage – is not so outlandish. 

Both the 10th-century Byzantine text De Administrando Imperio and the 12th-century Rus text Nestor Chronicle describe instances of Vikings hauling ships over land. Now, a study taking place in Scotland could be about to provide further confirmation of this seemingly remarkable feat. 

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Gjellestad Viking ship in danger of disappearing

Sindre Martinsen-Evje, the mayor of Østfold County Municipality in Norway, has called for urgent action to help preserve the Gjellestad Viking ship burial site. 

Although the site was only excavated in 2020 and 2021, time is already ticking as archeologists seek to save the remnants of the first Viking ship burial to be found in Norway in over a century. 

Will it be gone forever? 

With the help of ground-penetrating radar, Gjellestad was discovered more than 100 years after the Oseberg ship was excavated in 1904. 

The Gjellestad dig, which took place near the town of Østfold on the Viksletta Plain, revealed the remains of both a large Viking ship burial and several other interesting finds, including horse teeth, a large amber bead, and a Viking axe. 

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That 800-Year-Old Corpse in the Well? Early Biological Warfare

The Well Man was little more than a myth until 1938, when archaeologists excavated an abandoned well in the ruins of Sverresborg, outside Trondheim in central Norway.
Credit...Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research

In the dying days of the 12th century, with Norway in the grip of civil wars, the Baglers, a faction aligned with the archbishop, laid siege to Sverresborg, the castle stronghold of King Sverre Sigurdsson. The monarch was away, so the besiegers pillaged the castle, burned down houses and poisoned the water supply by heaving the corpse of one of the king’s men headfirst down the well and filling the shaft with stones.

This early biological warfare is recorded in “Sverris Saga,” a contemporaneous biography of the king, who reigned over much of Norway from 1184 to 1202. Scholars have long debated the chronicle’s reliability as a historical document, but a study published Friday in the journal iScience recounts how researchers unearthed the body of the “Well Man” and, with the help of ancient DNA, have provided fresh details about who he was.

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What archaeologists are learning from the discovery of 50 extremely rare Viking skulls

Skeletons and skulls sit in graves at an excavation site of a 10th century Viking burial ground in Aasum, Denmark (Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved)

The discovery of 50 “exceptionally well-preserved” skeletons in a village in central Denmark could hold important clues to the Viking era.

Archaeologists made the landmark discovery that included a burial ground and the skeletons.

Experts hope to conduct DNA analyses and possibly reconstruct detailed life histories, as well as looking into social patterns in Viking Age, such as kinship, migration patterns and more.

“This is such an exciting find because we found these skeletons that are so very, very well preserved,” said archeologist Michael Borre Lundø, who led the six-month dig. “Normally, we would be lucky to find a few teeth in the graves, but here we have entire skeletons.”

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Archaeologists Reveal Viking Treasure Left Buried for 1,000 Years: 'Unique'

The Viking treasure discovered in Årdal, Norway. The hoard consists of silver bracelets that are thought to be more than 1,000 years old.
Volker Demuth/Museum of Archaeology, University of Stavanger

"This is undoubtedly the most significant event of my career," Demuth told ScienceNorway.

The treasure was first spotted by UiS field archaeologists Mari Krogstad Samuelsen and Ola Tengesdal Lygre. The researchers were part of a team, alongside Demuth, who were brought in to survey the site before the construction of a tractor road on the mountainside by a local farmer, who owns the land.

"At first I thought it was a question of some twisted copper wires that you can often find in agricultural land, but when I saw that there were several lying next to each other and that they were not copper at all, but silver, I realized that we had found something exciting," Lygre said in the press release.

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Excavation of prehistoric tomb expected to start

The excavation of the prehistoric site is expected to start on Monday

An archaeological excavation of a prehistoric tomb in Alderney is due to begin later, Guernsey Ports says.

The site, known as Houguette de la Taille, is located outside the current perimeter of Alderney Airport.

It is one of three historic sites identified by planners as part a wider refurbishment of the airport, which was granted in May.

One of the conditions of that planning approval was written documentation of an investigation into any archaeological remains, before any construction work started.

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Remote Ancient Mountain Shelter Used by Viking Age Travelers Found

A lake in Hardangervidda National Park, Norway. The shelter used during the Viking Age was found in the Hardanger Plateau, much of which is protected as part of the park.
Pascal Goetzinger/iStock/Getty Images Plus

Archaeologists have found a remote mountain shelter used by travelers during the Viking Age.

The team identified the rock cabin along an ancient transport route across the Hardanger Plateau, a mountain plateau in central southern Norway, ScienceNorway reported.

The historic transport route, known as the Nordmannslepa, was long used to move goods and animals between eastern and western Norway.

In this mountainous landscape, weather conditions are harsh, making it difficult for ancient travelers to find shelter. As a result, people in ancient times constructed stone huts at suitable distances so that travelers could seek shelter and rest after a long day's journey.

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Danish archaeologists unearth 50 Viking skeletons

The excavation of a large Viking-era burial site in Denmark has unearthed 50 unusually well-preserved skeletons that archaeologists expect will help shed light on the lives of the Nordic people best known for their seafaring exploits in the Middle Ages

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L’Anse aux Meadows: The Viking Settlement of North America

In the 1960s, Anne and Helge Ingstad discovered an 11th-century Viking settlement in L’Anse aux Meadows, Canada, proving that the Vikings made it to North America.

For years, people passed on their legends orally before eventually writing them down. The Greenlanders’ Saga and The Saga of Erik the Red immortalized the tales of the Vikings’ westward voyages featuring Leif Erikson. Leif, born around 970 CE in Iceland to Erik the Red and Thorhild, led the expeditions. According to the sagas, Erik the Red discovered Greenland, setting the stage for Leif’s own explorations. He assembled a team of thirty men and embarked on the journey. Discovering an environmental paradise with lush meadows, forests, a serene lake, and abundant salmon, Erikson and his crew chose to settle there. They established camp and made it their home. Centuries before Christopher Columbus, the Vikings had reached a New World, if the sagas were accurate. Finally, evidence confirming their arrival was discovered at L’Anse aux Meadows, Canada.

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Slavic settlement and burial ground found in Saxony-Anhalt

Image Credit : LDA

Archaeologists from the State Office for Monument Preservation and Archaeology (LDA) of Saxony-Anhalt have discovered a Slavic settlement and associated burial ground near the town of Wettin-Löbejün, Germany.

During the Migration Period and the Early Middle Ages (5th to the 10th century AD), the Early Slavs established control over extensive regions of Central, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, establishing the foundations for the Slavic nations.

The original homeland of the Slavs is uncertain due to a lack of historical records, however, many scholars suggest that they originate from somewhere in Central-Eastern Europe.

Excavations were in preparation for the construction of the SuedOstLink, a planned underground cable connection from Wolmirstedt (Saxony-Anhalt) to Landshut (Bavaria).

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Anglo-Saxons may have fought in northern Syrian wars, say experts

Exotic items found at sites such as Sutton Hoo may have been brought to England by returning warriors, rather than via trade. Photograph: Joe Giddens/PA

Sixth-century Anglo-Saxon people may have travelled from Britain to the eastern Mediterranean and northern Syria to fight in wars, researchers have suggested, casting fresh light on their princely burials.

St John Simpson, a senior British Museum curator, and Helen Gittos, an Oxford scholar, have concluded that some of the exotic items excavated at Sutton Hoo, Taplow and Prittlewell, among other sites, originated in the eastern Mediterranean and north Syria and cannot have been conventional trade goods, as others have suggested.

Simpson said that “compelling evidence” suggests the individuals buried at those sites had been involved in Byzantine military campaigns in northern Mesopotamia during the late sixth century, fighting the Sasanians, an ancient Iranian dynasty.

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A Massive Viking Ship That May Have Been Part Of A Royal Burial Has Been Discovered At Norway’s Jarlsberg Manor

The flat fields surrounding Jarlsberg Manor contain numerous boat burials

Museum of Cultural History / University of Oslo

In 2018, a metal detector survey started turning up rivets at Jarlsberg Manor, the historic seat of the Wedel-Jarlsberg family and the Count and Countess of Jarlsberg, who led the County of Jarlsberg. Archaeologists quickly realized that the metal detectors were finding hundreds — if not thousands — of rivets, suggesting that a Viking ship was buried there.

Ship burials are an important part of Viking funerary traditions, and archaeologists suspect that this site could contain the remains of a Viking king named Bjørn Farmann.

After the initial metal detector survey in 2018, archaeologists arrived to thoroughly investigate the site at Jarlsberg Manor. After two weeks of digging, they knew exactly what lay beneath the rolling green fields.

“We’ve found a place for a ship burial,” excavation leader Christian Løchsen Rødsrud told Science Norway. “We can now say for certain that yes, here lie the remains of a Viking ship. This discovery adds a new landmark to the map, once a significant site during the Viking Age.”

The archaeologists uncovered 70 rivets during their dig, but the metal detector pinged so often that they believe that the grounds contain hundreds, if not thousands, of rivets. These rivets would have been capable of holding together planks that were about an inch thick, which suggests that they were part of a large ship — a Viking ship.

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Viking sword with 'very rare' inscription discovered on family farm in Norway

A farmer in Norway's southwestern Rogaland district found the clay-encrusted remains of the Viking Age sword in a field he was clearing. (Image credit: Rogaland County Council)

While clearing a field on his farm, a Norwegian man discovered a rare Viking Age sword that's thought to be 1,000 years old.

"We were about to start sowing grass on a field that has not been plowed for many years," Øyvind Tveitane Lovra, who found the weapon, said in a translated statement. 

When a piece of old iron turned up, he was about to throw it away. But a closer inspection revealed that it was most of a centuries-old sword, so he contacted archaeologists with the local government, as Norwegian law requires.

"I quickly realized that this was not an everyday find," said Lovra, who is a part-time farmer, ferry engineer and local politician in the Suldal municipality of Norway's southwest Rogaland county. "It's about our history, and it's nice to know what has been here before."

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Trove Of Coins Dating Back To The 1100s Found On Visingsö, Sweden

A large trove of coins dating back to the formation of Sweden in the 1100s has been discovered at Brahe Church on Visingsö, the island with rich history and many treasures related to Swedish history.

At that time, this island was a key battleground between the Houses of Sverker and Erik - the two strongest royal dynasties. Experts believe that the coins could potentially be among the oldest ever minted in Sweden.

A bracteate (from the Latin word 'bractea') means a thin metal piece, ands refers to a slim, one-sided gold medal. This piece of jewelry was primarily manufactured in Northern Europe during the Germanic Iron Age's Migration Period, including Sweden's Vendel era. It was typically worn as an adornment.

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Mystery Of The Haraldskærkvinnan (Haraldskærwoman) – Bog Body Of A Viking Queen?

Scientists have long tried to unravel the mystery of the bog body today known as Haraldskærkvinnan (Haraldskærwoman). With the help of historical records, archaeological investigations, and modern technology, it has been possible to shed a more comprehensive picture of events that took place more than 2,000 years ago.

The Discovery Of The Haraldskærkvinnan

Everything started on October 30, 1835, when two ditch diggers discovered a well-preserved preserved female body in muddy water in Haraldskær bog, just outside Vejle, Denmark. Tree hooks and branches held the naked, dead body under the water. A furrow around the neck may indicate that she was strangled before being placed in the bog.

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Vikings May Have Used Body Modification as a ‘Sign of Identification’

Examples of artificially altered bones belonging to island-dwelling Vikings may be examples of purposeful body modifications, according to a study published in the journal Current Swedish Archaeology. Researchers think they may have been part of social rituals of initiation.

For many years, historians had assumed that tattooing was the only form of body modification used by Scandinavians in the Viking Age. However, evidence of two other forms is beginning to change that narrative: filed teeth and elongated skulls.

Tooth modification from this period was first described around the 1990s, while skull modification is “a rather newly discovered phenomenon that requires intensive research,” write co-authors Matthias Toplak and Lukas Kerk, Germany-based archaeologists at the Viking Museum Haithabu and the University of Münster, respectively.

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Unravelling the mystery of England's Dark Age coins

According to archaeologists, England relied on silver imported from France to make its own coins around 1,300 years ago. Even older English coins used silver from the eastern Mediterranean, in the Byzantine Empir.

The study is the collaboration between researchers at the universities of Oxford, Cambridge and Vrije Universiteit in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. 

Lead author Dr Jane Kershaw from the University of Oxford said England imported silver from France from AD 750 to 820 at a time when relations were 'up and down'. 

'Relations were sometimes sour, but they weren't at war,' she told MailOnline.

For the study, the archaeologists analysed the chemical makeup of 49 silver coins minted in AD 660-820 England, the Netherlands, Belgium and northern France, all now housed at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge. 

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Roman Villa Full Of Miniature Votive Axes, Curse Tablets And Strange Artifacts Discovered In Oxfordshire

A large Roman villa was uncovered in Oxfordshire. Credit: Red River Archaeology Group

The complex was adorned with intricate painted plaster and mosaics and housed a collection of small, tightly coiled lead scrolls. The Red River Archaeology Group (RRAG), the organization responsible for coordinating the excavation, announced in a press release that these elements suggest that the site may have been used for rituals or pilgrimages.

Francesca Giarelli, the Red River Archaeology Group project officer and the site director, told CNN that the villa likely had multiple levels. The Roman villa complex, spanning an impressive 1,000 square meters (or 10,800 square feet) on its ground floor alone, was likely a prominent landmark visible from miles away.

“The sheer size of the buildings that still survive and the richness of goods recovered suggest this was a dominant feature in the locality if not the wider landscape,” says Louis Stafford, a senior project manager at RRAG, in the statement.

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Smallhythe: Riverside Romans and a royal shipyard in Kent

Today, Smallhythe Place in Kent is best known as a bohemian rural retreat once owned by the Victorian actress Ellen Terry and her daughter Edy Craig. As this month’s cover feature reveals, however, the surrounding fields preserve evidence of much earlier activity, including a medieval royal shipyard and a previously unknown Roman settlement (below, first image).

 

Our next feature comes from the heavy clays of the Humber Estuary, where excavations sparked by the

construction of an offshore windfarm have opened a 40km transect through northern Lincolnshire, with illuminating results (below, second image).

 

We then take a tour of Iron Age, Roman, and medieval Winchester, tracing its evolution into a regional capital and later a royal power centre.

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How hard working 'Lady of the Little Orme' was years ahead of her time

This 5,500-year-old skeleton named Blodwen on display at Amgueddfa Llandudno Museum 

(Image: Amgueddfa Llandudno Museum)

The roles of men and women have become more equal in recent decades with women excelling in traditionally male-dominated industries such as science, technology, the military and football. Indeed the pensionable age in the UK for both is now the same at 66.

But researchers have found a Neolithic woman who more than pulled her weight with heavy lifting as long ago as 3,500BC. Her remains, which were discovered in a crevice on Llandudno's Little Orme in the 19th Century, shed light on women's emancipation as long ago as the Stone Age.

Scores of history buffs will be able to learn all about this Lady of the Little Orme at Llandudno Museum this year. Her remaining bones are among an astonishing 9,000 artefacts at the centre, although there isn't room for all of them to be on display.

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Byzantium and the early Rus’, with Monica White

A conversation with Monica White about the earliest contacts between Constantinople and the first Rus’-Varangian raiders, traders, and mercenaries to cross the Black Sea. Who were these people, what did they want, and how did contact with East Roman culture change them?

Monica White is an Associate Professor in Russian and Slavonic Studies at the University of Nottingham.The conversation is based on a number of Monica’s recent publications, including ‘Early Rus: The Nexus of Empires‘; ‘The Byzantine “Charm Defensive” and the Rus”; and ‘Leo VI and the Transformation of Byzantine Strategic Thinking about the Rus”.

Byzantium & Friends is hosted by Anthony Kaldellis, a Professor at the University of Chicago. You can follow him on his personal website. You can listen to more episodes of Byzantium & Friends through Podbean, Spotify or Apple Podcasts

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'Extraordinary' Viking combs reveal Ipswich's medieval importance

Most of the combs were made from red deer antler, although some were made from bone

An unearthed collection of Viking combs is "extraordinary and unique in the UK", according to archaeologists.

The antler and bone finds were discovered in Ipswich, Suffolk, during 40 excavations over the course of 20 years.

Authors Ian Riddler and Nicola Trzaska-Nartowski said they included "an extraordinary sequence of Viking combs unmatched elsewhere in the country".

They indicate the presence of Vikings in Ipswich in the late 9th Century.

Riddler and Trzaska-Nartowski are among the authors of a recently published analysis of 1,341 finds and 2,400 fragments of waste unearthed during digs between 1974 and 1994.

"It was always our intention that the book had a European outlook and placed Ipswich in the centre of a developing early medieval world for one particular craft," they said in a statement about the analysis.

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Why Berserkers Were Some Of History’s Most Feared Warriors

Viking berserkers existed as mercenaries for hundreds of years during the Scandinavian Middle Ages, traveling in bands to fight wherever they could get paid. But they also worshiped Odin and were associated with mythological shapeshifters.

And eventually, Norse berserkers became so fearsome that they were entirely outlawed by the 11th century.

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10 Discoveries from Sutton Hoo’s Anglo-Saxon Ship Burial

Edith Pretty, one of England’s first female magistrates, owned a huge estate in south-east Suffolk known as Sutton Hoo. Pretty had been aware for some time that there was something intriguing about her Suffolk estate. Round mounds of earth loomed across it and in 1937, she decided the time had come to learn something about them. She contacted the Ipswich Museum, hoping to find a professional to excavate the mounds. The museum sent amateur archaeologist Basil Brown to Mrs. Pretty’s estate. Shortly thereafter, Brown began excavating, eventually uncovering the Anglo-Saxon world of Sutton Hoo.

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Intriguing Skull Modifications Discovered in Viking Women

A recent study delves into the discovery of three women from Viking-Age Gotland who underwent skull elongation. This investigation sheds light on the fascinating tradition of body modification prevalent among the Norse and Vikings.

The study, authored by Matthias Toplak and Lukas Kerk and published in the journal Current Swedish Archaeology, investigates archaeological findings from Gotland, where half of all documented cases of male teeth filing have been discovered. Alongside the intriguing possibility of Viking tattoos, these practices represent the known forms of body modification taking place in early medieval Scandinavia.

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Dark Age Kings of Britain Confirmed by Archaeology

Early Dark Age Britain is notorious for being poorly recorded. Most of our information about the era comes from much later records, written centuries after the events they allegedly describe. There is endless debate from scholars, based on the literary evidence, surrounding the historicity of the kings of Britain of this era. However, there are a few cases where we do not need to rely on the later medieval records to know whether a given king really existed or not. There are about 200 stone inscriptions from Dark Age Britain. These inscriptions provide us with contemporary or near-contemporary insights into the kings of Britain at that time.

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Magnet fisherman pulls a 1,200-year-old Viking sword out of a river

Trevor Penny found a Viking sword while magnet fishing in Oxfordshire
(Picture: Trevor Penny/Triangle News)

A magnet fisherman was shocked to learn a rusty sword he had pulled from a river was a 1,200-year-old Viking weapon.

Trevor Penny was using a powerful magnet to look for metal objects in the River Cherwell near Enslow in Oxfordshire when he made the fascinating find.

Excited, he notified his local finds liaison officer and gave the sword to experts to verify.

They have now dated the weapon to around 850 AD and say it would have once belonged to a Viking.

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7 Scientific Tools Archaeologists Use to Uncover the Viking World

Science loves the Vikings. NASA’s 1970s mission to Mars paid homage to the Vikings, and Bluetooth wireless technology takes its name from the Viking king of Denmark and Norway, Harald Bluetooth. The Bluetooth symbol on phones and computers also hails from Viking runes. Science has become essential to uncovering Viking archaeology, and new archaeological tools have allowed us to better understand the Viking world.

1. Strontium Isotope Analysis and Viking Archaeology

The Trelleborg Fortress located in Zealand, Denmark is a circular fortification divided into four quadrants. Inside each quadrant are longhouses. On its own, the fortress is an archaeological marvel, but the more archaeologists dig into the fortress, the more exceptional the monument proves to be.

King Harald Bluetooth organized defensive fortifications across the Viking world to maintain power during the 10th century. Excavations in Zealand from 1938-1940 revealed a fortification associated with Bluetooth’s reign and 157 buried individuals. But who were these people?

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Seeing the wood for the trees: How archaeologists use hazelnuts to reconstruct ancient woodlands

If we could stand in a landscape that our Mesolithic ancestors called home, what would we see around us? Scientists have devised a method of analyzing preserved hazelnut shells to tell us whether the microhabitats around archaeological sites were heavily forested or open and pasture-like. This could help us understand not only what a local environment looked like thousands of years ago, but how humans have impacted their habitats over time.

"By analyzing the carbon in hazelnuts recovered from archaeological sites in southern Sweden, from Mesolithic hunter-gatherer campsites through to one of the largest and richest Iron Age settlements in northern Europe, we show that hazelnuts were harvested from progressively more open environments," said Dr. Amy Styring of the University of Oxford, lead author of the article in Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology.

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Archaeologists decode the secrets held within Scotland's oldest manuscript

In a major archaeological discovery, the ancient monastery associated with the creation of the Book of Deer, Scotland's oldest surviving manuscript, has finally been unearthed. This remarkable discovery comes after centuries of speculation and uncertainty surrounding the precise location of this historical treasure. 

The Book of Deer, dating back to the 10th century, holds a significant place in Scotland's cultural and religious heritage, serving as a remarkable window into the early church, culture, and society of the time. Alongside its historical significance, the manuscript is renowned for featuring the earliest surviving Gaelic writing in Scotland, making this discovery a pivotal moment for the country's heritage and historical understanding.

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Researchers create method to detect cases of anemia in archaeological remains

Original micro-CT resolution(a) versus adjusted resolution for comparison to CT images(b) for the same individual. Sagittal micro-CT (a) and CT (b) reconstructions.
Credit: Journal of Archaeological Science (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.jas.2024.105942

Diagnosing anemia in living people is typically a matter of a routine blood test. Retrospectively diagnosing anemia in people who died decades or even centuries ago is much more challenging since there is no blood left to test.

Anthropologists at McMaster University and the University of Montreal, working with a hematologist colleague, have overcome that obstacle by developing a way to detect anemia through patterns in the structures of bones.

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Excavations at the medieval Beaumont Abbey in France have revealed nearly 800 years of history before the French Revolution shut it down.

Excavation of the servants' cemetery at Beaumont Abbey.
(Image credit: Copyright Jean Demerliac, Inrap)

The excavation of a medieval French abbey has revealed more than 1,000 burials, including those of plague victims, in its cemetery as well as the remains of a nearly 1,200-year-old village underneath the building.

The dig at Beaumont Abbey reveals almost eight centuries of use before the events of the French Revolution shut it down. This is the first time a European abbey has been fully excavated, producing new information about the evolution of the Catholic convent.

Located outside of Tours in the Loire Valley of France, roughly 110 miles (178 kilometers) southwest of Paris, Beaumont Abbey was founded in 1002 on a site that had already been occupied by the village of Belmons since at least 845. Historical records show that the abbey grew quickly, becoming the largest community of nuns in the province.

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Kyivan Rus: The First East Slavic State

Long before Russia or Ukraine existed, there was Kyivan Rus.

Centuries before Russia or Ukraine raised arms against each other, Scandinavians made their way to Novgorod before moving on to Kyiv.

Kyivan Rus rose up during the 9th century and laid the foundations for the development of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus.

The city of Kyiv was the heart of Kyivan Rus, a loosely bound federation of principalities, each under the governance of its individual prince.

The state reached its pinnacle in the late 10th century when it adopted Christianity from Byzantium, marking the conversion of Kyivan Rus into Orthodox Christianity.

It also was a crucial hub for trade between the Baltic and Black Seas, helping foster growth and cultural exchange. This fusion of Slavic and Byzantine aesthetics in art, architecture, and political rule emerged. While it was taking in and absorbing influences around it, it was truly becoming a culture of its own. 

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Up to 50,000 coins from the 4th century discovered off of Sardinia

Archaeologists exploring the waters off the Italian island of Sardinia have discovered a cache of between 30,000 and 50,000 coins dating back to the first half of the 4th century.

The Italian Ministry of Culture announced the find, which were initially made by a diver swimming just off the north-eastern coast of Sardinia. They quickly reported the discovery to officials, including the Cultural Heritage Protection Unit of Sardinia, and a larger search was organized.

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The Vinland Map: How a Mysterious Forgery Fooled Experts for Decades

The Vinland Map courted controversy from the moment its discovery was announced. / Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University // Public Domain (map); wilatlak villette/Moment/Getty Images (background)

In 1965, Pennsylvania Supreme Court justice Michael A. Musmanno traveled to Yale University to look at a map that, until recently, had been kept a closely guarded secret.

The document, dubbed the Vinland Map, was said to date back to 1440. It was inscribed with a phrase alternately deciphered as Vinlanda Insula, Vimlanda Insula, or Vinilanda Insula, and depicted a version of North America that included Greenland as an island as well as part of what appears to be the North American coast. When translated, text on the map seemed to corroborate the events of what are known as the Vinland Sagas, two 13th-century Icelandic texts that speak of legendary explorer Leif Erikson arriving in North America—likely present-day Newfoundland, Canada—by way of Greenland around 1000. If legit, as the university claimed it was, the map was the earliest representation of North America and provided more evidence that Vikings had made it to the continent nearly 500 years ahead of Christopher Columbus—who, although he sailed for Spain, was Genoese by birth and was later embraced by Italian Americans as a hero.

In a blow to their pride, the map’s existence was announced in a splashy press conference just before the holiday honoring the explorer. With it came a book written by scholars who had worked in secret for seven years to verify the map’s authenticity. “Cartographic Scholarship Turns Over New Leif,” the Los Angeles Times punned.

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Bones Reveal Bog Man's Secret Life Before His Violent End in a Foreign Land

Vittrup man's teeth reveal his maritime origins.
Arnold Mikkelsen/Fischer et al., PLOS One, 2024)

Violently bludgeoned to death and left in a Danish bog, the Stone Age individual known as 'Vittrup man' was discovered in 1915 by peat cutters in the midst of harvest.

His murder – thought to have been part of a ritualized sacrifice – occurred sometime between 3300 and 3100 BCE, during the height of the local Funnelbeaker culture.

Archeologists now have the strongest evidence yet that this is not where his life began.

The first hint that Vittrup man was a foreigner in Denmark came from a study investigating Mesolithic and Neolithic gene pools of Eurasia.

This revealed that Vittrup man's DNA was distinct from the other skeletons from this time found in the area, which prompted archeologist Anders Fischer from the University of Gothenburg in Sweden and his colleagues to investigate further.

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11,000-year-old Stone Age structure discovered underwater

Researchers have found a prehistoric man-made stone wall that could be dating back some 11,000 years just off the coast of modern-day Germany. Jacob Geersen, a marine geologist now at the Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research, found the wall during a night lecture with his students who were mapping with echosounders a swath of seafloor off the coast of Germany. “The idea would be to create an artificial bottleneck with a second wall or with the lake shore,” Geersen told the Guardian. According to experts, the stone wall is more than half a mile long and dates back to the Stone Age.

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4,000-year-old copper dagger found in Poland

A rare copper dagger dating back more than 4,000 years has been discovered in a forest near Jarosław, southeastern Poland. Shaped like a flint dagger from the period, it is just over four inches long, but that is actually a large dagger compared to similar such finds because the metal was hard to come by and very valuable. This is the oldest dagger ever discovered in the Subcarpathian Voivodeship (province).

The blade was discovered last November by metal detectorist Piotr Gorlach from the Historical and Exploration Association Grupa Jarosław, an organization of local history enthusiasts who search for archaeological materials with the permission of government heritage officials. Gorlach was looking for military objects from the World Wars that day without success. He had given up and was heading towards his car when his detector signaled the presence of metal under the forest floor. He saw the metal piece aged with a green patina and quickly realized it was much older than shrapnel from World War I. He alerted the voivodeship’s conservator of monuments and archaeologists from the Orsetti House Museum in Jarosław were deployed to examine the find.

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A 2,000-Year-Old Rune-Inscribed Knife Sheds Light on Denmark’s Past

The knife engraved with runes believed to be Denmark's oldest.
Photo: Rógvi N. Johansen, Museum Odense.

Archaeologists from the Museum Odense in Denmark recently unearthed a significant historical artifact: a small, 2,000-year-old knife bearing an exceptionally rare runic inscription.

The text, composed of five runes concluding with three depressions engraved into the knife, uses the oldest known runic alphabet. The runes represent the word “hirila,” interpreted to mean “Little Sword” in Old Norse. While it remains uncertain whether “hirila” refers to the knife itself or its owner, archaeologists affirm its status as a cherished possession interred in a grave almost two millennia ago. The relic was found under the remnants of an urn in a small burial ground east of Odense.

Speaking on the national significance of the discovery, museum inspector and archaeologist Jakob Bonde was thrilled. “It is a unique experience to stand with such an old and finished written language,” he said. “A runic inscription is like finding a message from ancient people.”

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Danish Unknown Royal Family Discovered Thanks to Ring

Courtesy National Museum of Denmark.

 

The Merovingian line ruled the Franks from the middle of the fifth century until 751. The Merovingians play a prominent role in French historiography and national identity. When it comes to the ring, 39-year-old Lars Nielsen extracted it from the earth. After that, he gave it to the Museum Sønderjylland, in Haderslev. Afterwards, the institution gave the ring to Copenhagen’s National Museum of Denmark.

Kirstine Pommergaard of the National Museum examined the ring and found that its design is similar to those of rings worn by influential Merovingians. She goes on to say that the ring not only announces the arrival of a new family. Additionally, it links Emmerlev to one of the biggest European power centres throughout the Iron Age. The ring possibly belonged to a princess who wed a different prince in the area.

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Gold Ring Possibly Linked to Royal Family Discovered by Metal Detectorist

Lars Nielsen was casually using his metal detector while exploring the Emmerlev area in Denmark when he made quite the surprising discovery: a large and luxurious-looking gold ring set with a red semiprecious stone. It turns out it's much more than just a nice piece of jewelry that someone might have left behind. 

Researchers have been looking into the ring's origins and believe that it dates back to the 5th or 6th century. According to the Danish news site Via Ritzau, the discovery seemingly points to the long-ago presence of an unknown royal family in the area with close ties to the Merovingians, a royal family that once ruled the Kingdom of France. 

Kirstine Pommergaard, a curator and archaeologist at the National Museum of Denmark, explained what she found and how the ring's unique build connects it to the Merovingian elite. 

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Rare Merovingian gold ring found in Jutland

A metal detectorist has discovered a rare Merovingian gold ring dating to 500-600 A.D. in Emmerlev, Southwest Jutland, Denmark. The ring is made of 22-carat gold and is set with an oval cabochon almandine garnet, a red semi-precious stone prized among Germanic peoples as a symbol of power. The mount has four spirals on the underside and trefoil knobs where the band meets the bezel. The spirals and knobs are characteristic of the highest quality of Frankish manufacture, and rings of this type were worn by the elite of the Merovingian dynasty.

National Museum of Denmark curator Kirstine Pommergaard believes the quality and construction of the ring suggests there may have been an unknown noble family in the Emmerlev area with close connections to Merovingian royalty.

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Possible Viking-Age Marketplace Found in Norway

STAVANGER, NORWAY—According to a statement released by the University of Stavanger, a ground-penetrating radar survey conducted on Klosterøy, an island off Norway’s southwestern coast, has detected traces of possible pit houses, cooking pits, and pier or boathouse foundations that may have been part of a Viking Age marketplace. Investigation of this area of private farmland around the medieval Utstein Monastery over the years with metal detectors has also revealed coins and weights usually associated with trade, explained archaeologist Håkon Reiersen of the University of Stavanger Museum of Archaeology. “While many indicators suggest that this may be a marketplace, we cannot be 100 percent certain until further investigations are conducted in the area to verify the findings,” added archaeologist Grethe Moéll Pedersen of the Museum of Archaeology. To read about possible evidence for the Vikings' long-distance trading activity, go to "Viking Trading or Raiding?"

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These Ancient Remains and Relics Reveal Poland’s Bronze Age Rituals

Though the lake near Papowo Biskupie is now drained and dry, nearby lakes (including Lake Starogrodzkie in Poland’s Chełmno County) provide a picture of what the ancient waters could’ve looked like when bodies and bronze treasures were deposited beneath the surface.
(Credit: Mrugas PHOTOgraphy/Shutterstock)

There’s no better place to put bodies and bronze treasures than in the bed of a small, shallow lake. At least, that’s what the Bronze Age people of Poland believed, according to a new article in Antiquity.

Published in the journal in January, the article reports that researchers recently found a stash of Bronze Age remains and relics that trace as far back as 1000 B.C.E. Recovered from an ancient, long-lost lake in an archaeological area near Papowo Biskupie in Poland, the stash challenges common conceptions about Poland’s past and suggests that the site possessed some sort of ancient, sacrificial significance.

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Stone Age 'megastructure' under Baltic Sea sheds light on strategy used by Paleolithic hunters over 10,000 years ago

Northern and Central Europe in the Late Upper Palaeolithic (white areas = ice-co

Archaeologists have identified what may be Europe's oldest human-made megastructure, submerged 21 meters below the Baltic Sea in the Bay of Mecklenburg, Germany. This structure—which has been named the Blinkerwall—is a continuous low wall made from over 1,500 granite stones that runs for almost a kilometer. The evidence suggests it was constructed by Paleolithic people between 11,700 and 9,900 years ago, probably as an aid for hunting reindeer.

The archaeologists investigating the Bay of Mecklenburg used a range of submarine equipment, sampling methods and modeling techniques to reconstruct the ancient lake bed and its surrounding landscape. This revealed that the Blinkerwall stands on a ridge running east to west, with a 5km-wide lake basin a few meters below the ridge to the south.

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New Medieval Books: Beowulf and the North Before the Vikings

Beowulf and the North Before the Vikings

By Tom Shippey

Arc Humanities Press

ISBN: 9781802700138

How much history is there in the story of Beowulf? The author argues that we can learn more about the people and places mentioned in the poem than has been commonly accepted, and it also sheds light on the Viking raids that began at the end of the eighth century.

Excerpt:

Beowulf’s anti-historical critics do of course have a point. If you believe that history cannot be written without dates and documents, then Beowulf offers neither. On the other hand, students of prehistory are accustomed to making what they can of other kinds of evidence, like legends and late traditions. And there is in addition the solid and ever-increasing evidence of archaeology, the “open frontier” of Beowulf-studies and of early history. As Ulf Näsman, Professor of Archaeology at Linnaeus University in Sweden, puts it: “archaeologists can write history.” Moreover, and as it happens, even for Beowulf we do have some surprising documentary evidence, which also gives us a date.

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Vikings and their impact in Britain examined in new set of stamps issued by Royal Mail

The impact the Vikings had on Britain is being examined in a new set of stamps issued by Royal Mail. 

The eight stamps feature Viking artefacts and locations of significance from around the UK.

These include an iron, silver and copper sword, a silver penny minted in York, silver and bronze brooches, an antler comb and case from Coppergate, York, and a Hogback gravestone from Govan Old, Glasgow.

The release of the collection also marks 40 years since the Jorvik Viking Centre opened in York.

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Traces of Saxon town found beneath London’s National Gallery

 Archaeologists from Archaeology South-East have uncovered traces of the Saxon town of Lundenwic beneath the National Gallery in London.

Following the collapse of Roman Britain, Londoninium (London) fell to ruin and was abandoned during the 5th century AD.

Anglo-Saxons settled 1.6 km’s to the west of the former Roman capital, establishing a small town known as Lundenwic in the area of present-day Covent Garden.

During the 6th century AD, England was split into multiple Anglo-Saxon kingdoms termed the Heptarchy. As borders changed through conquest and marriage, the town of Lundenwic found itself first within the domain of Essex, then Mercia, and subsequently Wessex.

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Ship burial discovered in Norway predates Viking Age

A burial mound explored last June in Norway holds the remains of a ship that predates the Viking age. Archaeologists believe this is Scandinavia’s oldest known ship burial.

Archaeologists and a metal detectorist conducted the survey at Herlaugshagen at Leka, which is located in Trøndelag County in central Norway. Carried out by NTNU Science Museum and Trøndelag County Municipality, it was funded by a grant of NOK 100,000 from Norway’s National Antiquities Agency. The purpose was to be able to date the burial mound more closely, and possibly confirm whether the burial mound may have contained a ship. The archaeologists found iron rivets, a horse’s tooth, preserved remains of wood and charcoal.

The rivets allowed the researchers to date the site. “The mound was constructed in approximately 700 CE,” said Geir Grønnesby, an archaeologist at the NTNU University Museum. “This is called the Merovingian period and precedes the Viking Age. This dating is really exciting because it pushes the whole tradition of ship burials quite far back in time.”

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10 Facts About L’Anse aux Meadows, North America’s Only Viking Ruins

Recreated Viking sod houses behind a wooden fence at L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, Canada. / Dylan Kereluk, Wikimedia Commons // CC BY 2.0

L’Anse aux Meadows, an archaeological site in Newfoundland, Canada, represents the first and only confirmed Viking presence in North America—proving beyond doubt that Vikings reached the Americas some 400 years before Christopher Columbus. Here are 10 facts about L’Anse Aux Meadows and some of its mysteries that are yet to be solved.

1. Vikings were not the first people to live at L’Anse aux Meadows.

Archaeological evidence of fireplaces, tent rings, and other artifacts suggest that several Indigenous groups lived at L’Anse aux Meadows before and after the Vikings occupied the site. They include peoples of the Maritime Archaic tradition from roughly 4000 to 1000 BCE, the Groswater tradition from 1000 BCE to 500 CE, and the Middle Dorset Culture from 400 to 750 CE. Historians believe there were no people present at the time of the Norse arrival, though.

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Early medieval sword fished out of Polish river is in 'near perfect' condition

Images of the early medieval sword as well as an X-ray image. (Image credit: O. Ochotny)

Workers made a surprising discovery in Poland when they pulled an early medieval sword from a muddy riverbed while dredging, and some researchers think the weapon could have a Viking connection.

The 1,000-year-old sword, which is thought to be older than Poland itself, was found cloaked in silt and in "near perfect" condition in the depths of the Vistula (also spelled Wisła) River, which runs through Włocławek, a city in northern Poland, according to Warsaw Point, a Polish magazine. 

Local authorities contacted the Provincial Office for the Protection of Monuments about the unusual finding. The city’s Center for Sport and Recreation announced the discovery Jan. 12 via a Facebook post.

X-ray imaging revealed that the sword's blade contained an inscription that reads "U[V]LFBERTH," which could be read as "Ulfberht" — "a marking found on a group of 170 medieval swords found mainly in northern Europe" that may be a Frankish personal name, according to CBS News.

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