Obsidian and the Lapita at Teouma
Monday October 31, 2011
I'm drawn to the story of the Lapita colonization of the Remote Oceania parts of the Pacific, and that's only partly because of the stunning beauty of the island environments.
... Read More
Identifying the Effects of Landnám
Wednesday October 26, 2011
Landnám ("land take" in Old Norse) is a type of agriculture used in the 9th and 10th centuries by Norse farmers during their expansion into the Atlantic from their homes ... Read More
Guide to the Moche
Monday October 24, 2011
Recently, I ran across a terrifically comprehensive article by scholar Claude Chapdelaine on the Moche in the Journal of Archaeological Research, and I used it as a starting point to ... Read More
Pre-Clovis Megafaunal Hunters
Friday October 21, 2011
The Manis Mastodon site, reported in Science today, is throwing (yet another) curve ball into what scholars understand about the founding populations of North America.
3-D Reconstruction of the Bone ... Read More
Ancient Road Systems
Wednesday October 19, 2011
Ancient road systems are feats of engineering that represent a wide range of uses and considerations. Road systems could have been built primarily for maintaining trade, like the Silk Road; ... Read More
Archaeology and the History of Alcohol
Monday October 17, 2011
The history of alcoholic beverages has a special fascination to archaeologists and anthropologists. Partly, the fascination rests in the economics of manufacture, trading and consuming alcohol, for home brew, special ... Read More
100,000 Year Old Paint Pots at Blombos Cave
Friday October 14, 2011
Reported in Science today are the results of investigations at Blombos Cave, a Middle Stone Age site on the Indian Ocean coast of South Africa. Researchers report that they found ... Read More
The Piazza dei Cavalieri Blacksmith Shop
Wednesday October 12, 2011
This photo is the backside of a statue of the Grand Duke Cosimo I de' Medici, grand duke of Tuscany and friend and patron of Leonardo di Vinci in the ... Read More
The Real Mound Builders
Friday October 7, 2011
One of the joys of my childhood growing up in Illinois was my parents taking us to Mississippian mound sites and letting us hang out at the museums. Often the ... Read More
Pushing Back Pottery's Invention
Wednesday October 5, 2011
This may not be news to everyone, but it's news to me: there is a cave site in Hunan province, China, containing potsherds dated to 15,000-18,000 years ago.
Incipient Jomon Pot ... Read More
Yana Rhinoceros Horn Site
Monday October 3, 2011
The Yana Rhinoceros Horn Site, or Yana RHS, is a 27,000 year-old site above the Arctic Circle in Siberia, if you can imagine. And it might hold the key (or ... Read More