Prehistoric Bug Extravaganza

Prehistoric Bugs; impressive, long lasting, and forgotten. Let’s give extinct bugs some love at a lightning fast speed, where I try to cover the most impressive and important bugs of prehistory.

Blue-eyed humans have a single, common ancestor

People with blue eyes have a single, common ancestor, according to new research. A team of scientists has tracked down a genetic mutation that leads to blue eyes. The mutation occurred between 6,000 and 10,000 years ago. Before then, there were no blue eyes.

“Originally, we all had brown eyes,” said Hans Eiberg from the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine at the University of Copenhagen.

The mutation affected the so-called OCA2 gene, which is involved in the production of melanin, the pigment that gives colour to our hair, eyes and skin.

“A genetic mutation affecting the OCA2 gene in our chromosomes resulted in the creation of a ‘switch,’ which literally ‘turned off’ the ability to produce brown eyes,” Eiberg said.

The genetic switch is located in the gene adjacent to OCA2 and rather than completely turning off the gene, the switch limits its action, which reduces the production of melanin in the iris. In effect, the turned-down switch diluted brown eyes to blue. If the OCA2 gene had been completely shut down, our hair, eyes and skin would be melanin-less, a condition known as albinism.

“It’s exactly what I sort of expected to see from what we know about selection around this area,” said John Hawks of the University of Wisconsin-Madison, referring to the study results regarding the OCA2 gene. Hawks was not involved in the current study.

Baby blues

Eiberg and his team examined DNA from mitochondria, the cell’s energy-making structures, of blue-eyed individuals in countries including Jordan, Denmark and Turkey. This genetic material comes from females, so it can trace maternal lineages.

They specifically looked at sequences of DNA on the OCA2 gene and the genetic mutation associated with turning down melanin production.

Over the course of several generations, segments of ancestral DNA get shuffled so that individuals have varying sequences. Some of these segments, however, that haven’t been reshuffled are called haplotypes.

If a group of individuals shares long haplotypes, that means the sequence arose relatively recently in our human ancestors. The DNA sequence didn’t have enough time to get mixed up.

“What they were able to show is that the people who have blue eyes in Denmark, as far as Jordan, these people all have this same haplotype, they all have exactly the same gene changes that are all linked to this one mutation that makes eyes blue,” Hawks said in a telephone interview.

Melanin switch

The mutation is what regulates the OCA2 switch for melanin production. And depending on the amount of melanin in the iris, a person can end up with eye colours ranging from brown to green.

Brown-eyed individuals have considerable individual variation in the area of their DNA that controls melanin production. But they found that blue-eyed individuals only have a small degree of variation in the amount of melanin in their eyes.

“Out of 800 persons we have only found one person which didn’t fit — but his eye colour was blue with a single brown spot,” Eiberg told LiveScience, referring to the finding that blue-eyed individuals all had the same sequence of DNA linked with melanin production.

“From this, we can conclude that all blue-eyed individuals are linked to the same ancestor,” Eiberg said. “They have all inherited the same switch at exactly the same spot in their DNA.” Eiberg and his colleagues detailed their study in the online edition of the journal Human Genetics.

That genetic switch somehow spread throughout Europe and now other parts of the world.

“The question really is, ‘Why did we go from having nobody on Earth with blue eyes 10,000 years ago to having 20 or 40 per cent of Europeans having blue eyes now?” Hawks said. “This gene does something good for people. It makes them have more kids.”

Source: https://archaeology-world.com/blue-eyed-hu...

The 2,000-year-old Sapphire ring is full of mysteries and strange things happen to its weare

An exquisite 2,000-year-old sapphire ring which is thought to have belonged to Roman Emperor Caligula - and is one of the 'Marlborough Gems' - is being sold for close to £500,000.

The sky blue hololith, made from a single piece of the precious stone, is believed to have been owned by Caligula, who reigned from 37AD until his assassination four years later.

The face engraved into the bezel is thought to be his fourth and last wife Caesonia, who was said to be so beautiful Caligula paraded her naked in front of his friends.

Caesonia, who was played by Dame Helen Mirren in the 1979 erotic historical drama Caligula, was assassinated almost immediately after her husband.

Stricken with grief at his death, she reportedly willingly offered her neck to the assassin, telling him to kill her without hesitation.

The ring is the star attraction at an exhibition of more than 100 engraved gems which will be held in London by Royal jewellers Wartski next week.

The gems will be available for purchase, with prices ranging from £5,000 to £500,000.

The sale has sparked worldwide interest, with collectors from as far afield as Japan queuing outside their premises days before the exhibition to be first through the door.

The 'Caligula ring' resided to the collection of the Earl of Arundel from 1637 to 1762, at which point it became one of the famous 'Marlborough Gems'.

This was a collection of 800 engraved jewels amassed by politician George Spencer, 4th Earl of Marlborough, in the late 18th and early 19th century.

They were sold in 1875 by John Winston Spencer-Churchill, 7th Duke of Marlborough, to pay for repairs on the ancestral home of Blenheim Palace, Oxon.

The collection was bought in its entirety by David Bromilow, of Bitteswell Hall in Leicestershire, for the princely sum of £35,000 (the equivalent of £2.2million in today's money).

This ring was then sold by his daughter in 1899 at a Christie's auction in London to dealer Julius Goldschmidt.

Its provenance is not known until it emerged for auction with Sotheby's in London in 1971, fetching just £750.

It then featured in a French private collection before being acquired by Wartski, who are jewellers to the Queen and Prince Charles.

Currently, only a quarter of the 'Marlborough Gems' are accounted for, with the location of the rest remaining a mystery.

Kieran McCarthy, Wartski director, said: 'This ring is one of the prestigious 'Marlborough Gems', having previously been in the collection of the Earl of Arundel.

'It is crafted entirely of sapphire. Very few horoliths exist and I would argue this is the best example you can find.

'We believe it belonged to the debauched Emperor Caligula and the engraving shows his final wife Caesonia.

'The gems at the exhibition have prices ranging from £5,000 to £500,000. While we don't want to disclose its price out of discretion for potential buyers, this gem is at the top end of that range.'

Source: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7...

Beautiful detailed depictions of prehistoric people

\Even though we have a lot of evidence about mankind and its development through scientific research and archeological discoveries, there are still some "mysteries" to be explored. One of them is the facial features of people in different periods of their existence.

Thanks to modern scientific techniques and the help of artificial intelligence, researchers can now give us a digital picture of the appearance of these people - prehistoric or ancient - with relative accuracy.

Below are some of the best illustrations:

Stone Age woman (Czech Republic)

A skull initially misidentified as male, found in a cave in Mladeč (Czech Republic), turned out to be the skull of a 17-year-old Stone Age woman who lived about 31,000 years ago. Researchers believe the skull dates to the Upper Paleolithic, the Aurignacian period, and is one of the oldest Homo sapiens found in Europe.

Cicero Moraes / Jiri Sindelar/Karel Drbal

Woman from the Bronze Age (Spain)

Archeologists from the Autonomous University of Barcelona discovered the remains of a Bronze Age man and woman buried together in a ceramic vessel in the La Almoloya area. A scientific illustrator created a digital representation of the woman using part of her skull and her jewelry, particularly a silver crown, to estimate the size of her head.

Joana Bruno / ASOME / Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona

Stone Age Woman (Sweden)

The remains of this Neolithic woman were found in the late 1920s during the construction of a road in Lagmansören, Sweden. A forensic scientist spent more than 350 hours creating her likeness based on a representation of her skull and findings about migration in ancient Scandinavia.

Bronze Age woman (Czech Republic)

The bones of this Bronze Age woman, who is believed to have lived between 1880 BC and 1750 BC, were found in a cemetery near the village of Mikulovice in Bohemia, Czech Republic. This wealthy woman belonged to the Únětice culture, which is known for its metal objects. It is therefore not surprising that she was buried with five copper bracelets, two gold earrings and a necklace with more than 400 amber beads.

Αrchiv MZM

Neolithic Woman (Penang, Malaysia)

Using a combination of 3D images and computed tomography scans (CT) of modern Malaysians, researchers have created a virtual approximation of the face of this 40-year-old Neolithic woman. She was discovered during excavations at the Neolithic site of Guar Kepah in Penang, northwestern Malaysia. The bones of the "Penang woman" indicate that she lived about 5,700 years ago.

Universiti Sains Malaysia / Cicero Moraes

The Woman of the Middle Ages (Scotland)

Thanks to modern forensic science and technology, researchers were able to gain insight into life in medieval Scotland by creating a representation of this medieval woman, one of three skeletons found in a medieval tomb in Scotland. Chris Rynn, the forensic cranial anthropologist who made this lifelike facial reconstruction, said this is "the most symmetrical skull" they have ever worked on.

Chris Rynn

Medieval priests and bishops (Scotland)

The remains of these two men were found in the same medieval crypt in Scotland as those of the previous woman. Starting with a 3D scan of the two skulls, Rynn created these incredibly realistic facial renderings, right down to the priest's cleft lip and palate.

Chris Rynn

Young Neanderthal

About 70,000 years ago, this young Neanderthal lived in an area known as Doggerland, off the coast of Holland. Using a piece of skull found at the bottom of the North Sea, a paleoanthropological artist was able to create this bust of "Krijn", right down to the tumor above his right eyebrow.

RMO

Ancient Egyptians

The faces of three men who lived in the ancient Egyptian city of Abusir el-Meleq more than 2,000 years ago come to life in this rendering. DNA data was extracted from their mummies and used in a process called "forensic DNA phenotyping," which uses genetic analysis to predict the shape of facial features and other aspects of a person's physical appearance. This information helped scientists reconstruct the three men of age 25.

Parabon NanoLabs

"Vampire" of the 18th century

Buried in Griswold, Connecticut, in the mid-eighteenth century, the remains of this 55-year-old man were found with his thigh bones crossed over his chest - a sign that locals believed the man was a vampire. It used to be believed that people who died of tuberculosis, like this man, were vampires.

Parabon Nanolabs, Virginia Commonwealth University

The 18-year-old Avgi from Greece

Swedish sculptor Oscar Nilsson spent about 220 hours meticulously sculpting every muscle of Avgi's face. Not much is known about 18-year-old Avgi's life, except that her bones were found in the Theopetra Cave in central Greece and are about 9,000 years old.

Oscar Nilsson

Ancient Shaman

This hunter-gatherer was found in a grave at Skateholm, an archaeological site on the southern coast of Sweden, dating from 5,500 BC to 4,600 BC. The woman, who was 30 to 40 years old, sat on a "throne" made of deer antlers, was richly decorated and was believed to be an important person.

Gert Germeraad / Trelleborgs Museum

Ötzi the Iceman (Bronze Age, Alps)

Ötzi the Iceman was discovered by hikers in the Ötztal Alps on the Austrian-Italian border. He lived between 3350 and 3100 BC and died at the age of about 46 - a "long" life for a Bronze Age man. The complete facial reconstruction shows a man with a long nose, deep-set eyes, damaged skin and hair.

South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology / Foto Ochsenreiter

King Henry VII

Thanks to photogrammetry, graphic designer Matt Loughrey was able to create an amazingly photorealistic representation of England's King Henry VII, who died on April 21, 1509. Using the king's death mask - a wax mask from 1509 in which the king's likeness is preserved - Loughrey brought the ruler's face back to life.

Courtesy of Matt Loughrey / mycolorfulpast.com

Ancient Wari Queen

The skull of a Wari queen who lived about 1,200 years ago was discovered alongside numerous luxury items in a pyramid mausoleum called El Castillo de Huarmey in northern Lima, Peru. Queen Wari was buried in one chamber, while the rest of the tomb contained the remains of 58 noble women. They belonged to the Wari culture, which flourished in the area from 700 to 1,000 years ago AD. The reconstruction was made of plasticine and is based on the skull of the queen.

Oscar Nilsson

Mysterious Discoveries Science Still Can't Explain!

Check out these mysterious discoveries science still can't explain! This top 10 list of bizarre and unexplained archaeological findings has some weird discoveries we still don't have answers for today!

9,000-Year-Old Stonehenge-Like Structure Found Under Lake Michigan

Archaeologists found something much more fascinating than they got credit for when searching under the waters of Lake Michigan for shipwrecks: they uncovered a rock with a prehistoric carving of a mastodon, as well as a collection of stones arranged in a Stonehenge-like manner.

Gazing into the water

In modern archaeology, the use of remote sensing techniques is common: scientists regularly survey lakes and soil for hidden objects.

Archaeologists uncovered sunken boats and cars and even a Civil War-era pier at a depth of around 40 feet into Lake Michigan’s Grand Traverse Bay, using sonar techniques to search for shipwrecks, but among all these, they found this prehistoric surprise, which a trained eye can guess by looking at the sonar scans photos in this article.

“When you see it in the water, you’re tempted to say this is absolutely real,” said Mark Holley, a professor of underwater archaeology at Northwestern Michigan University College who made the discovery, during a news conference with photos of the boulder on display in 2007. “But that’s what we need the experts to come in and verify.

The boulder with the markings is 3.5 to 4 feet high and about 5 feet long. Photos show a surface with numerous fissures.

Some may be natural while others appear of human origin, but those forming what could be the petroglyph stood out, Holley said.

Viewed together, they suggest the outlines of a mastodon-like back, hump, head, trunk, tusk, triangular-shaped ear and parts of legs, he said.

“We couldn’t believe what we were looking at,” said Greg MacMaster, president of the underwater preserve council.

Specialists shown pictures of the boulder holding the mastodon markings have asked for more evidence before confirming the markings are an ancient petroglyph, said Holley.

“They want to actually see it,” he said. Unfortunately, he added, “Experts in petroglyphs generally don’t dive, so we’re running into a little bit of a stumbling block there.”

If found to be true, the wannabe petroglyph could be as much as 10,000 years old – coincident with the post-Ice Age presence of both humans and mastodons in the upper midwest.

The formation, if authenticated, wouldn’t be completely out of place. Stone circles and other petroglyph sites are located in the area.

The discovery was made back a few years ago, and surprisingly enough the find hasn’t been popularized at all, with little to no information available online, but I’ll be sure to update this post as soon as I can get ahold of more info.

Source: https://archaeology-world.com/9000-year-ol...

The Citadel Anasazi Ruins - The Fortress in the Sky

In this video, we hike up one of my favorite hikes I've ever done called the Citadel Ruins.

Citadel Ruins is a 6.4 mile moderately trafficked out and back trail located near Mexican Hat, Utah that offers scenic views and is rated as moderate. The trail is primarily used for hiking, walking, nature trips, and bird watching and is best used from March until September.

Secret Egyptian Tomb Reveals Ancient 4400-Year Old Mystery

During the month of March 2019 in Egypt, a group of archaeologists dug up a cemetery. In this vast necropolis, the first pharaohs were buried many centuries ago, underneath tombs and pyramids that protected their remains from prying eyes as dynasties came and went. However, quite recently, the researchers discovered an astounding finding.

And we’re here today to tell you about a buried tomb that held a mystery dating back 4,400 years. So watch this video till the end.

New Discoveries at 11,000-Year-Old Sefer Tepe: Archaeological Update

Sefer Tepe is one of the 12 Pre-Pottery Neolithic Tas Tepeler sites of Turkey, not as well-known as Gobekli Tepe or Karahan Tepe but it’s proving to be an important part of the story.

It was only discovered in 2003, located around 50 km east of Gobekli Tepe and 18 km away from Karahan Tepe. The site is a small, broad and shallow limestone mound with the ancient settlement built directly onto the bedrock and covering an area of 1,000 square metres.

It's a settlement that was built in the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B, between 10 and 11,000 years ago and it's proving to be a very important site in ancient Turkey. Watch this video to get the latest archaeological update on Sefer Tepe and see all the new discoveries unearthed.

When Life Nearly Died

A large chuck of siberia covering an area larger than western Europe is taken up by ancient cooled lava like a wound in the earths crust. 250 million years ago this formation caused the worst extinction event known to have happened in the earths history.

Scientist Finally Know The Importance Of The Egyptian River Thebes

There are so many relics of Egypt's glorious past along the Nile's banks at Luxor that the area is often referred to as the world's largest open-air museum. The scientific community also places a high value on Thebes, a city that sits on the banks of the Nile. Why do you think that is? Let's discover that!

SCARIEST Archaeological Discoveries EVER That Prove Giants Actually Existed

Puzzling ancient finds have a way of captivating the public, perhaps because it's just too easy to dream up interesting explanations for how and why things exist. According to a recent study, the first full ancient skeleton of a person with gigantism has been found close to Rome.

What Hidden Beneath The Sahara's Sands? Incredible Facts About This Desert

Endless sandy landscapes lie in the Sahara Desert in the absence of people under the scorching sun. It is one of the most famous deserts worldwide, and when you look at this desert, it has various mysteries hidden deep under the sand dunes. So, let’s find out what is hidden under the sands of the Sahara and some incredible facts about this desert in this video. Watch until the end to avoid missing out on all the discoveries.

12 Most Incredible Finds Scientists Can't Explain

At some stage over the passing of the centuries, we've lost a lot of ancient knowledge. Some people think there must have been lost civilizations who once walked the face of the Earth, and all that remains of them now are their artifacts, which we're unable to understand or explain. Others feel that we simply aren't as spiritually wise or architecturally clever as we used to be, and so we no longer understand the purpose behind what our ancestors did or how they did it. Either way, the planet is covered in stunning mysteries, and here's a whole collection of them for you to gaze upon in wonder!

Archaeological New Discoveries Made At The Egyptian Tombs | The SAQQARA Necropolis

It has been reported that Egypt has discovered five ancient tombs in the Saqqara region, and the country has announced the discovery. At this point, do you know anything about this? In that case, there is a mysterious world just waiting to tell you everything there is to know about it. This is the most recent find in a long line of discoveries made in the enormous graveyard south of Cairo. This particular finding has just been uncovered quiet lately. Let's not squander any more time and get down to discussing it, so let's get started immediately!