Sunday, January 31, 2010
The Assembly Project awarded £850,000 to study Vikings and Early Medieval Europe
Over £850,000 has been made by medieval scholars from the Universities of Durham, Oslo and Vienna and the University of the Highlands and Islands, Centre for Nordic Studies, Orkney, by the Humanities in Europe Research Awards Scheme. This will fund a three-year, international effort, known as The Assembly Project, is designed to explore the role of assemblies or things in the creation, consolidation and maintenance of collective identities, emergent polities and kingdoms in early medieval Northern Europe.
Orkney and Shetland are to be research sites for a major project looking at the way the Viking communities governed themselves and strengthened their groups.
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Oldest Roman coin in Britain discovered on museum shelf
The oldest Roman coin in Britain has been discovered after sitting on a shelf for a decade.
The silver denarius Roman Republic coin dating from 211BC was found during an excavation in 2000 at Hallaton, Leics.
But the coin sat in storage at a Leicester museum with 5000 other coins found at the dig, waiting to be dated by experts.
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The Roman Army Knife: Or how the ingenuity of the Swiss was beaten by 1,800 years
The world's first Swiss Army knife' has been revealed - made 1,800 years before its modern counterpart.
An intricately designed Roman implement, which dates back to 200AD, it is made from silver but has an iron blade.
It features a spoon, fork as well as a retractable spike, spatula and small tooth-pick.
Experts believe the spike may have been used by the Romans to extract meat from snails.
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Sweden celebrates the 800th birthday of Birger jarl
A jubilee celebration is being held for the 800th anniversary of the birth of Birger jarl, one of Sweden' most important medieval statesmen. Among the events planned for this year is the excavation of the tomb belonging to his son, King Magnus III.
The anniversary of the birth of Birger jarl will be inaugurated on 6 February at Bjälbo in Östergötland, where Birger Jarl was born 800 years ago. More than 130 specially invited guests and media representatives will be participating in vespers in the church, followed by dinner at Stadshotellet in Skänninge. The participants will include representatives of the three regions responsible for the Jubilee – Eastern Götaland, Western Götaland and Stockholm.
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Horizontal and vertical: The evolution of evolution
JUST suppose that Darwin's ideas were only a part of the story of evolution. Suppose that a process he never wrote about, and never even imagined, has been controlling the evolution of life throughout most of the Earth's history. It may sound preposterous, but this is exactly what microbiologist Carl Woese and physicist Nigel Goldenfeld, both at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, believe. Darwin's explanation of evolution, they argue, even in its sophisticated modern form, applies only to a recent phase of life on Earth.
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Silver coin dating to 211 BC is oldest piece of Roman money ever found in Britain
A 2,221-year-old silver coin dug up as part of a hoard is the oldest piece of Roman money ever found in Britain.
Dating from 211 BC and found near the Leicestershire village of Hallaton, the coin was uncovered with 5,000 other coins, a helmet and a decorated bowl.
Unearthed in 2000 by a metal detectorist, staff at the nearby Harborough Museum have only just realised its significance.
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Archaeologists unearth Iron Age settlement in Kent
The remains of an Iron Age settlement have been unearthed by archaeologists working along the route of a new £1.3m water pipeline in Kent.
Evidence of a dwelling, postholes, pits, ancient hearths and pieces of pottery were found on land in Pembury.
South East Water plans to lay a 4.6km (2.9 mile) pipe between Kipping's Cross Service Reservoir and Pembury.
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Theatregoers in Shakespeare's day 'enjoyed peaches, figs and oysters'
Tudor theatregoers enjoyed walnuts, peaches and figs and even the odd oyster, according to the most detailed ever study of a playhouse from the age.
A rich variety of seafood was on offer to peckish audience members, including crabs, cockles, mussels, periwinkles and whelks.
Sturgeon steaks were also popular with 16th century audiences enjoying plays by Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe.
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Did Leonardo paint himself as "Mona Lisa"?
The legend of Leonardo da Vinci is shrouded in mystery: How did he die? Are the remains buried in a French chateau really those of the Renaissance master? Was the "Mona Lisa" a self-portrait in disguise?
A group of Italian scientists believes the key to solving those puzzles lies with the remains — and they say they are seeking permission from French authorities to dig up the body to conduct carbon and DNA testing.
If the skull is intact, the scientists can go to the heart of a question that has fascinated scholars and the public for centuries: the identity of the "Mona Lisa." Recreating a virtual and then physical reconstruction of Leonardo's face, they can compare it with the smiling face in the painting, experts involved in the project told The Associated Press.
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Stanford Students Dig Into Archeological Site
This summer, in the far reaches of Northern England, an international excavation team gathered at the small town of Binchester, just south of Hadrian’s Wall. Shovels and pickaxes in hand, the group, consisting primarily of students from Stanford and Durham University UK, broke the surface soil on new trenches at one of the UK’s most significant archaeological sites.
The site, which has been the focus of archaeological interest for over a hundred years, posed fresh challenges for the team, whose objective was to explore the lifestyles and population of the Roman fort and town at Binchester. This summer’s dig focused on unearthing the Roman barracks at the corner of the fort.
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Thursday, January 28, 2010
Viking settlement unearthed by OPW
DUBLIN’S NORTHSIDE is revealing its own Viking past with the first evidence of 11th-century Dubliners choosing to settle on the north shore of the Liffey emerging in the past week.
Clear signs of a late-11th century – ie Viking – house have been found at a site in the Smithfield area owned by the Office of Public Works (OPW). Excavation works, commissioned and funded by the OPW, have been under way at Hammond Lane, off Church Street, since last year.
Some 17th- and 18th-century artefacts have been found since then, while evidence of a “substantial Viking house” was uncovered there last week, said excavation director Colm Moriarty.
National Museum director Pat Wallace said the great significance of the find lay in the location of the house north of the Liffey.
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Burst water main floods city excavation
GALLONS of water poured into the historic Beverley Gate excavation after a water main burst in Hull city centre.
The problem left businesses in the Princes Quay area without supplies.
The 12in-wide pipe burst at about 8am yesterday.
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Last Neanderthals died out 37,000 years ago
The paper, by Professor Joao Zilhao and colleagues, builds on his earlier research which proposed that, south of the Cantabro-Pyrenean mountain chain, Neanderthals survived for several millennia after being replaced or assimilated by anatomically modern humans everywhere else in Europe.
Although the reality of this 'Ebro Frontier' pattern has gained wide acceptance since it was first proposed by Professor Zilhao some twenty years ago, two important aspects of the model have remained the object of unresolved controversy: the exact duration of the frontier; and the causes underlying the eventual disappearance of those refugial Neanderthal populations (ecology and climate, or competition with modern human immigrants).
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Up Helly Aa in pictures: Viking festival in Lerwick, Shetland Islands
Members of the Viking Jarl Squad march with burning torches during the annual Up Helly Aa Festival, Lerwick, Shetland Islands. Up Helly Aa celebrates the influence of the Scandinavian Vikings in the Shetland Islands and has employed this theme since 1870. Up Helly Aa is held on the last Tuesday in January every year, whatever the weather
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Rosslyn Chapel scanned in 3D
The famous Rosslyn Chapel in Scotland has been photographed in intricate detail using cutting edge digital technology.
The project to capture details of the 15th Century building was developed by Historic Scotland and Digital Design Studio at the Glasgow School of Art. Their aim is to survey and interpret heritage structures, creating the definitive 3D record of the architecture down to the millimetre.
Terrestrial laser scanning, in combination with other digital technologies, is an extremely effective method of precisely documenting an object, building or landscape.
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Delving into the history of 'things'
Orkney and Shetland are set to become research sites for a major project looking at the way Viking communities governed themselves and strengthened their groups.
Around £118,000 has been awarded to the Centre for Nordic Studies for research on administrative organisation and Norse “things” — governing assembly sites — in areas of Viking settlement and colonisation.
The centre — supported by UHI, the prospective university of the Highlands and Islands — is involved in a three-year project with Oslo, Vienna and Durham universities. Centre director,
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Penises and caustic soda: the case of the Cambridge antiquities
The antiquities gallery at the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge reopens to the public on Saturday – with some fascinating stories
In the Greek and Roman gallery in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge –
one of the most important collections of antiquities in the country,
which reopens to the public on Saturday after a £950,000 makeover –
there is one Greek pot the eye might easily flit past.
Unless, that is, you happen to take more than a cursory view at the
central figure's genital area. In the bowl of this 5th-century Attic
kylix (drinking cup), is the figure of a man, naked but for a cloak,
and holding a lyre and a staff. But something rather peculiar seems to
have happened: there's a noticeably smudged, discoloured patch around the groin area.
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Could there be another gold hoard near Tamworth?
FIFTY pieces of gold have been found just 10 miles from where the Staffordshire hoard was discovered – but their origins may remain forever a mystery.
James Stanfield (67) unearthed the gold in a Kingsbury field, but experts have been unable to date it accurately.
Mr Stanfield told the Herald: "The finding of the Staffordshire hoard just 10 miles away has just made me want to find out more.
"I just want someone to help me investigate – and if it does turn out that it is just scrap gold, then I have not lost anything, but if it is something important connected to the hoard, then the whole country will gain."
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Viking Society Student Conference 2010
Viking Society Student Conference 2010
Published by Chris Abram on January 28, 2010 12:42 pm under Conferences
The Viking Society is holding its annual student conference in London on 13 February. Everybody is welcome to attend–whether a student or not or a Society member or not.
The theme of this year’s conference is Skaldic Poetry.
The conference will be held in the Gustave Tuck Lecture Theatre, University College London. (South Junction of the main building, at the top of the stairs. Registration and refreshments will be in the Jeremy Bentham Room.)
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Ambassador or slave? East Asian skeleton discovered in Vagnari Roman Cemetery
A team of researchers announced a surprising discovery during a scholarly presentation in Toronto last Friday. The research team, based at McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada, has been helping to excavate an ancient Roman cemetery at the site of Vagnari in southern Italy. Led by Professor Tracy Prowse, they’ve been analyzing the skeletons found there by performing DNA and oxygen isotope tests.
The surprise is that the DNA tests show that one of the skeletons, a man, has an East Asian ancestry – on his mother’s side. This appears to be the first time that a skeleton with an East Asian ancestry has been discovered in the Roman Empire.
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