Lapis Niger: The Mysterious Sanctuary Beneath Ancient Rome

Giacomo Boni, a Venetian archaeologist, was named director of the Roman Forum excavations in the Italian capital in 1898. He kept this position until his passing in 1925. An Iron Age necropolis, the Regia (originally a barracks and later the seat of Rome's greatest pope), the temple of Vesta, and other structures are among the findings he made during that time.

Diagram of the Lapis Niger in 1906/ photo public domain on Wikimedia Commons

The Lapis Niger (black stone), an ancient sanctuary where one of the first known Latin inscriptions was discovered and dated between 570 and 550 BC, is one of its most notable findings in the Forum. Even the Romans themselves could not fully understand this sanctuary, despite it being regarded as a hallowed area, until the time of Julius Caesar. It was a component of the historic Comitium, the Forum's northwest-facing public gathering space for the curiate assembly.

It is thought that this sanctuary was reformed at precisely the time of Julius Caesar (or earlier, according to other experts, during the reign of Sulla, who ruled between 81 and 80 BC). A new structure with black marble flooring is thought to have been built at that time. What made it so intriguing was what it covered; at a depth of 1.5 meters, Boni discovered the indicated inscription and an ancient tomb, whose owner the Romans had long since forgotten by the time of Caesar.

Generation after generation, they revered and preserved the site because they were certain that it was significant and hence sacred. Since they didn't know who was interred there, a number of rumors started to circulate and eventually became into tales. One of them said that it would be the grave of Romulus, the founding figure and first ruler of Rome, who was assassinated in the Vulcan temple that was next to the Lapis Niger.

whereas Romulus, when he vanished, left neither the least part of his body, nor any remnant of his clothes to be seen. So that some fancied, the senators, having fallen upon him in the temple of Vulcan, cut his body into pieces, and took each a part away in his bosom; others think his disappearance was neither in the temple of Vulcan, nor with the senators only by

Plutarch, Vidas Paralelas, Life of Romulus 1, 27-6

The pillar with the inscription in Lapis Niger / photo Giovanni Dore on Wikimedia Commons

According to other legends, it could be the resting place of Faustulus, the shepherd who discovered and raised Romulus and Remus, or it could be the grave of Hostus Hostilius, the grandfather of King Tullus Hostilius (third king of Rome between 673 and 642 B.C. ), who was one of the Celeres, Romulus' personal bodyguard.

As you can see, Romulus is the subject of all of these hypotheses. The issue is that there is no evidence for this link inside the Lapis Niger. In fact, the earliest texts that make reference to it already cast doubt on the tales and lean toward concluding that it was most likely the location from which the kings addressed the populace and senate.

Interpretation of the inscription / photo ImperioRomano.com

In addition to the pillar with the inscription, the Boni excavations discovered countless ceramic fragments, votive statuettes, and proof of ritual animal sacrifices, all of which were hidden behind a layer of gravel that had been added on purpose. All of these remains have been dated to the 5th to 7th centuries BC. That is, at the earliest, at the time of Romulus' passing and the start of the rule of Numa Pompilius (716–674 BC), who succeeded him and was also Romulus' brother-in-law.

The site underwent numerous changes throughout the years, including fires and partial destruction as a result of wars and invasions, until it was rebuilt in the first century BC when a more modest altar with a floor made of black marble was built over it.

As for the inscription, it is, as we have stated, the oldest Latin text yet discovered. But it has a few unique features. First of all, the alphabet used to write it is closer to that of Greek than Latin, placing it historically at the beginnings of the latter. The text is then written using the bustrophedon style, an ancient writing method that involves writing one line from left to right and the next from right to left or vice versa.

Pillar replica / photo sailko on Wikimedia Commons

Finally, because the inscription's beginning and end are gone and only half of each line remains, the interpretation of what it means is constrained. However, what can be read appears to suggest that the site was honoring a king (rex). The four pillar faces would be written as follows:

QVOI·HOI·SAKROS·ES·ED·SORD

OKAFHAS·RECEI·IO·EVAM·QVOSRE

M·KALATO·REM·HAB·TOD·IOUXMEN·TA·KAPIA·DOTAV

M·I·TERPE·M·QVOI·HA·VELOD·NEQV·IOD·IOVESTOD

Likewise, the widely accepted translation:

Whosoever (will violate) this (grove), let him be cursed. (Let no one dump) refuse (nor throw a body …). Let it be lawful for the king (to sacrifice a cow in atonement). (Let him fine) one (fine) for each (offence). Whom the king (will fine, let him give cows). (Let the king have a —) herald. (Let him yoke) a team, two heads, sterile … Along the route … (Him) who (will) not (sacrifice) with a young animal … in … lawful assembly in grove ..

The significance of this inscription rests in the fact that it provided the first epigraphic proof that kings previously reigned in ancient Rome. something that was mentioned in classical writings but was never confirmed.

We'll probably never know whether Romulus or one of those rulers was interred beneath the altar. The Lapis Niger must have been a founding monument of the city of Rome, around which the Roman people's meetings were conducted since very ancient times, practically all specialists agree.

2,000-year-old burial ground excavated, making it the "largest ancient cemetery ever discovered"

Palestinian laborers in the Gaza Strip have stumbled upon a sizable Roman-era cemetery with dozens of graves. Archaeologists have determined that the largest find of its sort in Gaza contains treasures that are roughly 2,000 years old, including two lead sarcophagi.

A 2,000 year old cemetery has been discovered in the Gaza Strip (Image: AFP via Getty Images)

The site was first discovered by the employees last year while they were working on a housing project in the northern part of the Strip that was funded by Egypt. Since then, teams have worked under the direction of French experts to excavate a 2,700 square meter area. What was once a plain-looking construction site has now been transformed into a treasure trove for historians trying to learn more about the area.

Due to its location on historic trade routes between Egypt and the Levant, Gaza has a lengthy history. However, a number of recent events, including the occupation by Israel, Hamas' takeover, and growing urbanization, have put the history of the besieged region in peril. A total of 75 additional graves have been located since the initial finding of 60 in January, several of which have undergone investigation.

The dig's director, a French archaeologist named Rene Elter, stated: “All of these tombs have almost already been excavated and have revealed a huge amount of information about the cultural material and also about the state of health of the population and the pathologies from which this population may have suffered.”

135 graves have been located at the site so far including two lead coffins ( Image: Majdi Fathi/NurPhoto/REX/Shutterstock)

“The discovery of lead sarcophagi here is a first for Gaza” Mr. Elter, the head of archaeology for Intiqal, a program run by nonprofit Premiere Urgence Internationale, exclaimed with excitement.

Due to the rarity of the lead tombs, Palestinian archaeologists including Fadel Al-Otul think social elites were interred at the location. In keeping with the Roman propensity to build cemeteries close to urban centers, Mr. Al-Otul indicated that the cemetery likely used to be situated inside of a city. Along with the sarcophagi, Mr. Elter's team is reconstructing skeletons and putting broken pieces of clay jars back together.

The remains will be returned to the Hamas-led Ministry of Antiquities and Tourism, according to Mr. Al-Otul, once the skeletons have undergone further analysis. "The Gazans deserve to tell their stories. Gaza boasts a plethora of potential archaeological sites, but monitoring each one, given the rapid pace of development, is no small feat."

Floods in Libya Uncover a New Building in an Ancient Greek City

The ancient Greek city of Cyrene is the only UNESCO-listed site in the area, and floods that killed hundreds of people in Libya also submerged parts of it, archaeologists say. This puts the structures in danger of collapsing.

The ancient Greek Temple of Zeus at Cyrene, Libya. Credit: David Stanley, CC BY 2.0/Wikipedia Commons

But at the same time, additional constructions were exposed by the floodwaters. Authorities from Libya who were sent to examine the ancient city and conserve what they could surprisingly discovered archaeological sites that had suddenly arisen after the floods.

A national council made up of professionals should be established, according to Dr. Ahmed Issa from the Department of Archeology at Omar Al-Mukhtar University, to classify new archaeological monuments and create a restoration strategy for the region.

The Temple of Zeus from the second century AD, which was larger than the Parthenon in Athens, sustained relatively minor immediate damage, but the water circling around their foundations poses a threat for further collapses, according to Vincent Michel, the head of the French archaeological mission in Libya.

ALERT- Floods that hit eastern Libya last week have damaged the @UNESCO world heritage site of Cyrene (locally known as Shahhat). Cyrene is a stunning ancient Greek later Roman city overlooking the coast, 60km west of Derna. I visited the site and this is what I found. THREAD pic.twitter.com/BbOCXC9pli

— Claudia Gazzini (@ClaudiaGazzini) September 18, 2023

“Since the stone in the region is of poor quality, the monuments risk falling apart due to lack of good foundations,” he added.

Speaking to AFP, he continued that "hundreds of cubic meters of water" had flooded the nearby necropolis, shifting and submerging some of the tombs.

About 60 kilometers (37 miles) west of the flood-stricken Derna sits the ancient Greco-Roman city of Cyrene (Shahhat).

The ancient Greek city of Cyrene in Libya is under danger of flooding

A large portion of the area is still flooded days after the massive rains brought on by Storm Daniel on September 10–11, according to Claudia Gazzini, a Libya expert with the International Crisis Group think tank, who recently visited the location.

The enormous site, which also has a necropolis outside its walls that is as large as the city itself, has some ancient walls that have collapsed, obstructing the water courses that would typically drain the area.

“There’s a street lined by ancient walls that connects the upper and lower levels down which rainwater would normally escape but large boulders have fallen in, blocking the flow,”, Gazzini told AFP.

“On the lower level, there’s also dirty water continuously bubbling out of the ground in the middle of the ruins,” she added, adding that neither locals from the nearby village of Shahat nor a representative from the local antiquities division, whom she met there, could explain where it was coming from.

“If water continues to flow in and remains trapped in the site, the retaining wall could collapse, taking with it a large chunk of the ruins,” she said.

Libya's ancient Greek city of Cyrene

The oldest and most significant of the five Greek cities in the area was Cyrene, an ancient Greek and subsequently Roman metropolis.

Eastern Libya now goes by the historical name of Cyrenaica, which it was given. The ancient Necropolis of Cyrene is close by.

A group of Greeks from the island of Thira, commonly known as Santorini, traveled south more than 2,000 years ago in pursuit of a new home. Their voyage came to an end in Libya, a country in modern-day northern Africa.

These Greek immigrants built a new city they named Cyrene. The city, which was established in 631 BC, soon had Battus as its first King in charge.

The earliest influential person in the dynasty that would later become known as the Battiads was Battus.

Every Greek city in what is now the modern Greek mainland and islands maintained trading relations with Cyrene, which was prosperous.

The temples, tombs, agora, gymnasium, and Cyrene Amphitheatre in this important ancient Greek city are all thought to have been influenced by Delphi's famous architectural landmarks.

Exploring the new UNESCO World Heritage Site in Palestine, Ancient Jericho

Ancient Jericho in the Israeli-occupied West Bank looks to be nothing more than a collection of sandy rock mounds surrounded by palm trees to the untrained eye. But if you look closely, you'll find traces of a long-gone civilization that was lauded for inventing advanced agricultural techniques, architectural techniques, and defense systems 4,000 years before anybody else. Fortunately, archaeologists have already done the job for us, and their discoveries at the Tell es-Sultan UNESCO World Heritage Site provide an intriguing look into one of the world's oldest and most sophisticated civilizations.

Jericho claims to be the oldest city in the world (Shutterstock)

Ain es-Sultan, a perennial spring, gave Ancient Jericho, which is located 1.5 km north of the present-day city of Jericho, its name. Around 10500 BC, hunter-gatherers decided to dwell on a nearby mound as a result of the nearby water source and the area's pleasant climate, which nurtured the surrounding land. On the 21m mound, or tell, a permanent Neolithic settlement had developed by 9000 BC. They were perhaps of the earliest people to rely on agriculture for survival. The locals domesticated animals, built granaries, dwellings, and irrigation channels and aqueducts in addition to growing crops. Naturally, hammers and axes were necessary for all of this, so these were also invented, along with pottery, while they were doing it.

Dwelling foundations unearthed at Jericho (Shutterstock)

In 8500 BC, people would come home from work to round, crude semi-subterranean homes. These transformed into more modern rectangular homes with stone foundations, dried-mud bricks, and floors polished with lime plaster. The emerging society also gave rise to some of the world's earliest political, economic, and religious systems.

The Neolithic people revered their ancestors and held a belief in life after death, according to cultic funeral rituals. They frequently unearthed bodies, cut off the heads, painted the skulls with priceless cinnabar pigment, adorned the eye sockets with seashells, and then reburied the bodies beneath the flooring of their homes and sacred buildings. Plastering skulls was subsequently supplanted by making plaster statues and clay animal figures, which had an impact on other Middle Eastern locations.

Tower of Jericho (Shutterstock)

Ancient Jericho evolved into the world's first fortified settlement about 9000 BC. The reasons why the settlement was strengthened are a matter of debate among experts; some propose military defense, protection from wild animals, flood control from surrounding rivers, or cultic practices. There is no disputing, however, that a bedrock-carved wall made of stones mortared in mud and surrounding the village. Later, a second, six-meter-tall wall, a three-meter-deep ditch, and an eight-meter-tall stone tower were built, the ruins of which still survive. The tower's interior includes a narrow staircase and mud-plastered walls covered in the fingerprints of laborers.

Despite a collapse during the Early Bronze Age between 4000 and 2000 BC, the people of Jericho restored or rebuilt their defense systems, and by 1000 BC, Ancient Jericho was a thriving cultural hub with 3,000 native Canaanites living there. Residents created avenues lined with furnished homes next to graves and public structures like a temple and multi-story palace (2700–2300 BC) using their new bronze equipment. On top of the remains of the first royal home, Hyksos Palace was built.

A plastered skull from Ancient Jericho (Alamy Stock Photo)

A surplus of agricultural output and handicrafts like baskets allowed the town's residents to engage in trade. Ancient Jericho became a prominent economic hub, facilitating the interchange of products along with ideas, beliefs, and values due to its location on a vital east-west route linking Asia, the Mediterranean, and Africa.

Ancient Jericho was one of Palestine's most significant Canaanite cities by the Middle Bronze Age. The Egyptian Pharaohs continuously besieged all Canaanite cities, ultimately destroying Ancient Jericho despite the groundbreaking earthen barriers. The city's heyday was finished by 1550 BC. It was barely occupied and all but forgotten until archaeologists began to look into it around 1868.

Since then, delicate excavations and preservation methods like using new mud bricks to safeguard susceptible structures and reversible mud plaster have preserved its originality. This draws 91,000 tourists a year, along with the opportunity to see a prehistoric village that was inhabited for 10,000 years. Pretty good for a bunch of rocks.

Moved to new location in Northern Ireland is a tomb that predates the Pyramids.

At a museum in Northern Ireland, a Neolithic tomb that predates the Egyptian pyramids has been placed on permanent display.

Ballintaggart Court Tomb at its new home outside the Ulster Folk Museum

It was uncovered near Ballintaggart, Co. Armagh, and has a history of more than 6,000 years.

One of around 400 of its kind on the island, the Ballintaggart Court Tomb is a group of upright stones that form a semicircular courtyard at the entrance to the burial chambers where human remains would have been left.

After being endangered by the expansion of a neighboring quarry, it was removed from its native place in 1966 and transported to Ulster Museum.

Now that the stones have been relocated, the building outside the attraction has been faithfully rebuilt using 3D modeling at Ulster Folk Museum.

The enormous constructions grew more prevalent in the nation as ancient people established permanent settlements, according to Dr. Greer Ramsey, curator of archaeology at National Museums NI.

William Blair, Joe Garvey, chairman of the Richmount Rural Community Association in Portadown, and Dr Greer Ramsey at the site

"Court tombs take their name from a semicircular arc of upright stones marking the entrance to the burial chambers," he said.

"The Neolithic period to which they belong was revolutionary as it marked the end to a nomadic or hunter-gatherer way of life. New settlers arrived about 6,000 years ago, bringing with them farming skills and many of the plants and domestic animals we are familiar with today. With a more secure food supply, people could live for longer in one place and invest in larger, more permanent structures, such as tombs."

As the Ulster Folk Museum unveiled its investment plans, which included opening up access to its collection, the tomb arrived at the location.

As part of normal admission, visitors can view the building outside in the museum's rural area.

At a German castle, a rare medieval octagonal tower was found

One of the original towers that guarded the fortress's main entrance has been found by archaeologists working at Neuenburg Castle in central Germany. They were taken aback by the tower's octagonal design, which was completed around the year 1100.

The Thuringian count Ludwig der Springer constructed Neuenburg Castle towards the end of the 11th century, and it was later enlarged during the 13th century. It is now one of Germany's biggest castles and is regarded as a cultural landmark of national importance.

Since 2022, the Neuenburg Castle, which stands above the town of Freyburg, has been the site of archaeological research by the State Office for Heritage Management and Archaeology Saxony-Anhalt. They concentrated their research on the 11,500 square meters of the outer bailey, one of Germany's largest outer baileys.

Neuenburg Castle’s octagonal tower – photo by Dirk Höhne / State Office for Heritage Management and Archaeology Saxony-Anhalt.

The researchers looked at a location where big stones had been found a few years earlier and compared it to the "Old Tower" location shown on three maps from the 19th and 20th centuries. Their excavation turned up the remnants of an octagonal structure with walls that were 1.7 meters thick and had a diameter of 10 meters. The tower was still standing, reaching a height of 2.2 meters, but it was once much taller. Even traces of a staircase and floors were discovered by the researchers.

Photo by Ines Vahlhaus / State Office for Heritage Management and Archaeology Saxony-Anhalt.

A tower similar to this one was seen around 50 meters to the south. Both are a part of the castle's original fortification system, which included significant defensive features. At roughly the same period, a rampart composed of limestone gravel, an inner ring wall, and a second outer wall that ran parallel at a distance of about six to eight meters were all constructed. A roughly ten-meter-deep trench was built in front of this. The two octagonal towers in this section of the fortification must have made an impressive spectacle.

The tower's octagonal shape would have been extremely unusual for Germany in the eleventh century. It was seen as a breakthrough in castle construction, but it wasn't utilized frequently until the later 12th and 13th centuries, particularly under Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II (1220–1250). The experts hypothesize that the towers lining Constantinople's city walls may have served as a source of inspiration for the architects.

The castle – photo by Gunar Preuß / State Office for Heritage Management and Archaeology Saxony-Anhalt.

Prior to further improvements to the castle, which will include the construction of a new workshop and administrative building as well as a barrier-free entry to the outer castle, the government of Saxony-Anhalt is conducting archaeological research.

Cleopatra and Ptolemies - The Greek Rulers of Egypt

In the following video we will recreate Cleopatra’s face as well as the faces of some other Ptolemy kings mixed with some historical facts about that Hellenistic kingdom.

The Bizarre Lifestyle of Qianlong, China's Emperor

A man who keeps his word is a man of honor, which is well illustrated by none other than the longest-reigning Emperor, Qianlong. He made a vow not to rule for more than his grandfather's reign, which was 61 years, and in his 60th year, he abdicated the throne to his son Jiaqing.

A Secret Tunnel Found in Mexico May Finally Solve the Mysteries of Teotihuacán

In the fall of 2003, a heavy rainstorm swept through the ruins of Teotihuacán, the pyramid-studded, pre-Aztec metropolis 30 miles northeast of present-day Mexico City. Dig sites sloshed over with water; a torrent of mud and debris coursed past rows of souvenir stands at the main entrance. The grounds of the city’s central courtyard buckled and broke. One morning, Sergio Gómez, an archaeologist with Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History, arrived at work to find a nearly three-foot-wide sinkhole had opened at the foot of a large pyramid known as the Temple of the Plumed Serpent, in Teotihuacán’s southeast quadrant.

“My first thought was, ‘What exactly am I looking at?’” Gómez told me recently. “The second was, ‘How exactly are we going to fix this?’”

Gómez is wiry and small, with pronounced cheekbones, nicotine-stained fingers and a helmet of dense black hair that adds a couple of inches to his height. He has spent the past three decades—almost all of his professional career—working in and around Teotihuacán, which once, long ago, served as a cosmopolitan center of the Mesoamerican world. He is fond of saying that there are few living humans who know the place as intimately as he does.

And as far as he was concerned, there wasn’t anything beneath the Temple of the Plumed Serpent beyond dirt, fossils and rock. Gómez fetched a flashlight from his truck and aimed it into the sinkhole. Nothing: only darkness. So he tied a line of heavy rope around his waist and, with several colleagues holding onto the other end, he descended into the murk.

Gómez came to rest in the middle of what appeared to be a man-made tunnel. “I could make out some of the ceiling,” he told me, “but the tunnel itself was blocked in both directions by these immense stones.”

In designing Teotihuacán (pronounced tay-oh-tee-wah-KAHN), the city’s architects had arranged the major monuments on a north-south axis, with the so-called “Avenue of the Dead” linking the largest structure, the Temple of the Sun, with the Ciudadela, the southeasterly courtyard that housed the Temple of the Plumed Serpent. Gómez knew that archaeologists had previously discovered a narrow tunnel underneath the Temple of the Sun. He theorized that he was now looking at a kind of mirror tunnel, leading to a subterranean chamber beneath the Temple of the Plumed Serpent. If he was correct, it would be a find of stunning proportions—the type of achievement that can make a career.

“The problem was,” he told me, “you can’t just dive in and start tearing up earth. You have to have a clear hypothesis, and you have to get approval.”

Gómez set about making his plans. He erected a tent over the sinkhole, to keep it away from the prying eyes of the hundreds of thousands of tourists who visit Teotihuacán each year, and with the help of the National Institute of Anthropology and History arranged for the delivery of a lawnmower-size, high-resolution, ground-penetrating radar device. Beginning in the early months of 2004, he and a handpicked team of some 20 archaeologists and workers scanned the earth under the Ciudadela, returning every afternoon to upload the results to Gómez’s computers. By 2005, the digital map was complete.

As Gómez had suspected, the tunnel ran approximately 330 feet from the Ciudadela to the center of the Temple of the Plumed Serpent. The hole that had appeared during the 2003 storms was not the actual entrance; that lay a few yards back, and it had apparently been intentionally sealed with large boulders nearly 2,000 years ago. Whatever was inside that tunnel, Gómez thought to himself, was meant to stay hidden forever.

Teotihuacán has long stood as the greatest of Mesoamerican mysteries: the site of a colossal and influential culture about which frustratingly little is understood, from the conditions of its rise to the circumstances of its collapse to its actual name. Teotihuacán translates as “the place where men become gods” in Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs, who likely found the ruins of the deserted city sometime in the 1300s, centuries after its abandonment, and concluded that a powerful ur-culture—an ancestor of theirs—must have once resided in its vast temples.

The city lies in a basin at the southernmost edge of the Mexican Plateau, an undulating landmass that forms the spine of modern-day Mexico. Inside the basin the climate is mild, the land riven by streams and rivers—ideal conditions for farming and raising livestock.

Teotihuacán itself was likely settled as early as 400 B.C., but it was only around A.D. 100, an era of robust population growth and increased urbanization in Mesoamerica, that the metropolis as we know it, with its wide boulevards and monumental pyramids, was built. Some historians have theorized that its founders were refugees driven north by the eruption of a volcano. Others have speculated that they were Totonacs, a tribe from the east.

Whatever the case, the Teotihuacanos, as they are now known, proved themselves to be skilled urban planners. They built stone-sided canals to reroute the San Juan River directly under the Avenue of the Dead, and set about constructing the pyramids that would form the city’s core: the Temple of the Plumed Serpent, the even larger 147-foot-tall Temple of the Moon and the bulky, sky-obscuring 213-foot-tall Temple of the Sun.

Clemency Coggins, a professor emerita of archaeology and art history at Boston University, has suggested that the city was designed as a physical manifestation of its founders’ creation myth. “Not only was Teotihuacán laid out in a measured rectangular grid, but the pattern was oriented to the movement of the sun, which was born there,” Coggins has written. She is far from the only historian to see the city as large-scale metaphor. Michael Coe, an archaeologist at Yale, argued in the 1980s that individual structures might be representations of the emergence of humankind out of a vast and tumultuous sea. (As is in Genesis, Mesoamericans of the time are thought to have envisioned the world as being born from complete darkness, in this case aqueous.) Consider the Temple of the Plumed Serpent, Coe suggested—the same temple that hid Sergio Gómez’s tunnel. The structure’s facade was splashed with what Coggins called “marine motifs”: shells and what appear to be waves. Coe wrote that the temple represents the “initial creation of the universe from a watery void.”

Recent evidence suggests that the religion practiced in these pyramids bore a resemblance to the religion practiced in the contemporaneous Mayan cities of Tikal and El Mirador, hundreds of miles to the southeast: the worshiping of the sun and moon and stars; the veneration of a Quetzalcoatl-like plumed serpent; the frequent occurrence, in painting and sculpture, of a jaguar that doubles as deity and protector of men.

Yet peaceful ritual was apparently not always enough to sustain the Teotihuacanos’ connection to their gods. In 2004, Saburo Sugiyama, an anthropologist from the University of Japan and Arizona State University, who has spent decades studying Teotihuacán, and Rubén Cabrera, of Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History, located a vault under the Temple of the Moon that held the remains of an array of wild animals, including jungle cats and eagles, along with 12 human corpses, ten missing their heads. “It is hard to believe that the ritual consisted of clean symbolic performances,” Sugiyama said at the time. “It is most likely that the ceremony created a horrible scene of bloodshed with sacrificed people and animals.”

Between A.D. 150 and 300, Teotihuacán grew rapidly. Locals harvested beans, avocados, peppers and squash on fields raised in the middle of shallow lakes and swampland—a technique known as chinampa—and kept chickens and turkeys. Several heavily trafficked trade routes were established, linking Teotihuacán to obsidian quarries in Pachuca and cacao groves near the Gulf of Mexico. Cotton came in from the Pacific Coast, ceramics from Veracruz.

By A.D. 400, Teotihuacán had become the most powerful and influential city in the region. Residential neighborhoods sprang up in concentric circles around the city center, eventually comprising thousands of individual family dwellings, not dissimilar to single-story apartments, that together may have housed 200,000 people.

Recent fieldwork by scholars like David Carballo, of Boston University, has revealed the sheer diversity of the citizenry of Teotihuacán: Judging by artifacts and paintings found inside surviving structures, residents came to Teotihuacán from as far afield as Chiapas and the Yucatán. There were likely Mayan neighborhoods, and Zapotec ones. As the scholar Miguel Angel Torres, an official at Mexico’s National Institute for Anthropology and History, told me recently, Teotihuacán was probably one of the first major melting pots in the Western Hemisphere. “I believe that the city grew a little like modern Manhattan,” Torres says. “You walk around through these different neighborhoods: Spanish Harlem, Chinatown, Korea­town. But together, the city functions as one, in harmony.”

The harmony did not last. There is a hint, in the demolition of some of the sculptures that adorn the temples and monuments, of periodic regime change in the ruling class of Teotihuacán; and, in the depiction of shield- and spear-toting warriors, of clashes with other local city-states. Perhaps, as several archaeologists suggested to me, civil war swept through Teotihuacán, culminating in a fire that seems to have damaged vast sections of the interior of the city around A.D. 550. Perhaps the fire was caused by a visiting army. Perhaps a large-scale migration occurred.

In A.D. 750, nearly 700 years after it was established, the city of Teotihuacán was abandoned, its monuments still filled with treasures and artifacts and bones, its buildings left to be eaten by the surrounding brush. The former residents of Teotihuacán, if they were not killed, were presumably absorbed into the populations of neighboring cultures, or returned along the established trade routes to the lands where their ancestral kin still lived throughout the Mesoamerican world.

They took their secrets with them. Today, even after more than a century of excavation at the site, there is an extraordinary amount we do not know about the Teotihuacanos. They did have some kind of quasi-hieroglyphic written language, but we haven’t cracked it; we don’t know what tongue was spoken inside the city, or even what the natives called the place. We have a conception of the religion they practiced, but we don’t know much about the priestly class, or the relative piety of the city’s citizenry, or the makeup of the courts or the military. We don’t know exactly what led to the city’s founding, or who ruled over it during its half-millennium of dominance, or what exactly caused its fall. As Matthew Robb, the curator of Mesoamerican art at San Francisco’s de Young Museum, told me, “This city wasn’t designed to answer our questions.”

In archaeology and anthropology circles—to say nothing of the popular press—Sergio Gómez’s discovery was greeted as a major turning point in Teotihuacán studies. The tunnel under the Temple of the Sun had been largely emptied by looters before archaeologists could get to it in the 1990s. But Gómez’s tunnel had been sealed off for some 1,800 years: Its treasures would be pristine.

In 2009, the government granted Gómez permission to dig, and he broke ground at the entrance of the tunnel, where he installed a staircase and ladders that would allow easy access to the subterranean site. He moved at a painstaking pace: inches at a time, a few feet every month. Excavating was done manually, with spades. Nearly 1,000 tons of earth were removed from the tunnel; after each new segment was cleared, Gómez brought in a 3-D scanner to document his progress.

The haul was tremendous. There were seashells, cat bones, pottery. There were fragments of human skin. There were elaborate necklaces. There were rings and wood and figurines. Everything was deposited deliberately and pointedly, as if in offering. The picture was coming into focus for Gómez: This was not a place where ordinary residents could tread.

A university in Mexico City donated a pair of robots, Tlaloque and Tláloc II, playfully named for Aztec rain deities whose images appear in early iterations throughout Teotihuacán, to inspect deeper inside the tunnel, including the final stretch, which descended, on a ramp, an extra ten feet into the earth. Like mechanical moles, the robots chewed through the soil, their camera lights aglow, and returned with hard drives full of spectacular footage: The tunnel seemed to end in a spacious cross-shaped chamber, piled high with more jewelry and several statues.

It was here, Gómez hoped, that he’d make his biggest find yet.

I met Gómez late last year, on a smoldering afternoon. He was smoking a cigarette and drinking coffee out of a foam cup. Tides of tourists swept to and fro over the grass of the Ciudadela—I heard scraps of Italian, Russian, French. An Asian couple stopped to peer in at Gómez and his team as if they were tigers at a zoo. Gómez looked back stonily, the cigarette hanging off his bottom lip.

Gómez told me about the work his team was doing to study the 75,000 or so artifacts they had already found, each of which needed to be carefully cataloged, analyzed and, when possible, restored. “I would estimate that we’re only about 10 percent through the process,” he said.

The restoration operation is set up in a cluster of buildings not far from the Ciudadela. In one room, a young man was sketching artifacts and noting where in the tunnel the objects had been found. Next door, a handful of conservators sat at a banquet-style table, bent over an array of pottery. The air smelled sharply of acetone and alcohol, a mixture used to remove contaminants from the artifacts.

“It might take you months just to finish a single large piece,” Vania García, a technician from Mexico City, told me. She was using a syringe primed with acetone to clean a particularly tiny crack. “But some of the other objects are remarkably well preserved: They were buried carefully.” She recalled that not long ago, she found a powdery yellow substance at the bottom of a jar. It was corn, it turned out—1,800-year-old corn.

Passing through a lab where wood recovered from the tunnel was being carefully treated in chemical baths, we stepped into the storeroom. “This is where we keep the fully restored artifacts,” Gómez said. There was a statue of a coiled jaguar, poised to pounce, and a collection of flawless obsidian knives. The material for the weapons had probably been brought in from the Pachuca region of Mexico and carved in Teotihuacán by master craftspeople. Gómez held out a knife for me to hold; it was marvelously light. “What a society, no?” he exclaimed. “That could create something as beautiful and powerful as that.”

In the canvas tent erected over the entrance to the tunnel, Gómez’s team had installed a ladder that led down into the earth—a wobbly thing fastened to the top platform with frayed twine. I descended carefully, foot over foot, the brim of my hard hat slipping over my eyes. In the tunnel it was damp and cold, like a grave. To get anywhere, you had to walk on your haunches, turning to the side when the passage narrowed. As protection against cave-ins, Gómez’s workmen had installed several dozen feet of scaffolding—the earth here is unstable, and earthquakes are common. So far, there had been two partial collapses; no one had been hurt. Still, it was hard not to feel a shiver of taphophobia.

Through the middle of Teotihuacán studies runs a division like a fault line, separating those who believe that the city was ruled by an all-powerful and violent king and those who argue that it was governed by a council of elite families or otherwise bound groups, vying over time for relative influence, arising from the cosmopolitan nature of the city itself. The first camp, which includes experts like Saburo Sugiyama, has precedent on its side—the Maya, for instance, are famous for their warlike kings—but unlike Mayan cities, where rulers had their visages festooned on buildings and where they were buried in opulent tombs, Teotihuacán has offered up no such decorations, nor tombs.

Initially, much of the buzz surrounding the tunnel beneath the Temple of the Plumed Serpent centered on the possibility that Gómez and his colleagues might finally locate one such tomb, and thereby solve one of the city’s most fundamental enduring mysteries. Gómez himself has entertained the idea. But as we clambered through the tunnel, he laid out a hypothesis that seemed to stem more directly from the mythological readings of the city laid out by scholars like Clemency Coggins and Michael Coe.

Fifty feet in, we stopped at a small inlet carved into the wall. Not long before, Gómez and his colleagues had discovered traces of mercury in the tunnel, which Gómez believed served as symbolic representations of water, as well as the mineral pyrite, which was embedded in the rock by hand. In semi-darkness, Gómez explained, the shards of pyrite emit a throbbing, metallic glow. To demonstrate, he unscrewed the nearest light bulb. The pyrite came to life, like a distant galaxy. It was possible, in that moment, to imagine what the tunnel’s designers might have felt more than a thousand years ago: 40 feet underground, they’d replicated the experience of standing amid the stars.

If, Gómez suggested, it was true that the layout of the city proper was meant to stand in for the universe and its creation, might the tunnel, beneath the temple devoted to an all-encompassing aqueous past, represent a world outside of time, an underworld or a world before, not the world of the living but of the dead? Up above, there was the Temple of the Sun and the eternal day. Down below, the stars—not of this earth—and the deepest night.

I followed Gómez down a short ramp and into the cross-shaped chamber directly under the heart of the Temple of the Plumed Serpent. Four archaeologists were kneeling in the dirt, brushes and thin-bladed trowels in hand. A nearby boombox blared Lady Gaga.

Gómez told me he had not been prepared for the sheer diversity of the objects he encountered in the farthermost reaches of the tunnel: necklaces, with the string intact. Boxes of beetle wings. Jaguar bones. Balls of amber. And perhaps most intriguingly, a pair of finely carved black stone statues, each facing the wall opposite to the entryway of the chamber.

Writing in the late 1990s, Coggins speculated that religious tradition at Teotihuacán would have been “perpetuated in the linked repetition of ritual,” likely on the part of a priesthood. That ritual, Coggins went on, “would have concerned the Creation, Teotihuacán’s role in it, and probably also the birth/emergence of the Teotihuacán people from a cave”—a deep and dark hole in the earth.

Gómez gestured at the area where the twin figures once stood. “You can imagine a scenario where priests come down here to pay tribute to them,” he explained—to the Creators of the universe, and of the city, one and the same.

Gómez has one more crucial task to undertake: the excavation of three distinct, buried sub-chambers located below the resting place of the figurines, the final sections of the tunnel complex as yet unexplored. Some scholars speculate that the elaborate ritual offerings on display here, and the presence of pyrite and mercury, which held known associations with the supernatural among ancient Mesoamericans, provide further evidence that the buried sub-chambers represent the entryway to a particular type of underworld: the place where the city’s ruler departed the world of the living. Others argue that even the discovery of long-sought human remains buried in spectacular fashion would hardly close the book on the mystery of Teotihuacán’s rulers: Whoever is buried here could be just one ruler among many, perhaps even some other kind of holy person.

For Gómez, the sub-chambers, whether they are filled with more ritual relics, or remains, or something entirely unexpected, might be best understood as a symbolic “tomb”: a final resting place for the city’s founders, of gods and men.

A few months after leaving Mexico, I checked in with Gómez. He was only marginally closer to uncovering the chambers beneath the end of the tunnel. His archaeologists were literally often working with toothbrushes, so as not to damage whatever lay beneath.

Regardless of what he found at the end of the tunnel, once his excavation was complete, he promised me, he’d be satisfied. “The number of artifacts we’ve uncovered,” he said, pausing. “You could spend a whole career evaluating the contents.”

Fossil prep: suspected 19-million-year-old fossil in a very soft matrix

In the video below we are prepping a fossil that was hiding in concretion. It was such a soft matrix that we could use a combination of a small screwdriver and a wooden toothpick to remove the siltstone to expose the crab.

The Top 5 Greatest Roman Generals of all Time

In the following video we will analyze the top 5 greatest Roman generals of all time. Watch the video to find out more!

Who Were The Pelasgians? (Pre-Historic People of Greece)

Unraveling the Enigma of Pre-Historic Greece

The ancient world, with its myriad cultures and mysterious pasts, has long captivated the imagination of historians and archaeologists alike. Among the many enigmatic groups that pepper the landscape of antiquity, few are as intriguing and elusive as the Pelasgians. Their story is woven into the very fabric of Greek history, emerging as a shadowy precursor to the luminous dawn of classical Greek civilization.

They are perceptible throughout a vast amount of time and space in the ancient Aegean world, but due to the passing of time and the subsequent dominance of Hellenic culture, they are still largely a mystery. Described variously by classical authors as the original inhabitants of Greece, their story is a tapestry of myth, legend, and fragmented historical accounts.

In exploring the Pelasgian enigma, one encounters a labyrinth of questions regarding their origins, language, and culture. Were they the first settlers of the Greek mainland, or a diverse group of indigenous people unified under a Greek nomenclature? Did they speak a language that was an antecedent to Greek or something entirely distinct? Theories abound, but answers are fleeting, like chasing shadows in the dim light of early dawn.

Origins and Identity

The term "Pelasgians" (Ancient Greek: Πελασγοί) primarily referred to the indigenous populations of Greece before the Hellenic era. According to historian Peter Green, this broad designation suggests a diverse and ancient group that predated and possibly influenced early Greek culture.

A lack of conclusive archaeological evidence and unambiguous historical records in antiquity obscures the origins and identity of the Pelasgians. They are often described as the autochthonous people of Greece, predating the arrival of Hellenic tribes. Ancient Greek writers variably portrayed them as ancestors or contemporaries of the early Greeks, possibly inhabiting regions across Greece, the Aegean islands, and parts of Anatolia.

The statements regarding the Pelasgians having lived in the Aegean region before the arrival of the Greeks are intriguing but not entirely supported by current scholarly consensus or scientific evidence. Addressing these assertions requires a careful examination of historical, archaeological, and linguistic evidence.

The consensus is that the Pelasgians were indeed a pre-Hellenic people inhabiting parts of Greece, the Aegean, and possibly other regions. However, the extent to which they were genetically related to the ancient Greeks, Thracians, and Illyrians is not definitively established. Genetic studies have advanced our understanding of ancient populations, but they do not yet provide conclusive evidence about the specific relationships between these groups.

Etymology and Mythology

The etymology of "Pelasgian" is shrouded in uncertainty. The Ancient Greeks linked the term to 'pelargos' (stork), suggesting a migratory origin. Another theory relates 'pelas' to 'near' or 'neighboring land'. Mythologically, the Pelasgians are often connected to the foundational myths of Greek culture. Pelasgus, a figure in Greek mythology, is sometimes considered their eponymous ancestor, often depicted as a primitive, earth-born king, reinforcing their image as the original inhabitants of the Greek lands.

A.J. Van Windekens, a prominent linguist and philologist, contributed significantly to the study of Indo-European languages and their etymology. In his exploration of the ethnonym "Pelasgos," Van Windekens proposed an intriguing etymology that diverges from more traditional interpretations.

According to Van Windekens, the name "Pelasgos" could be derived from an Indo-European root, which he posited as *bhelosgho-s. This root, in his interpretation, translates to "blooming branch" or something akin to it. This suggestion is perhaps quite poetic and symbolic, implying a connection to growth, fertility, or perhaps a flourishing civilization. On the other hand, this etymology may connect the Pelasgians with the Neolithic inhabitants of Greece. This is a fascinating topic that intertwines linguistic analysis with archaeological and historical evidence. Some scholars contend that the Pelasgians represent this pivotal period in Greek prehistory, which was characterized by significant agricultural advancements and the shift from nomadic to settled lifestyles. This hypothesis positions the Pelasgians as pivotal in the dawn of agriculture and settled civilization in ancient Greece, yet the lack of definitive evidence keeps their story enigmatic and largely interpretive.

Linguistic and Cultural Aspects

Linguistically, the Pelasgians are a conundrum. Greek sources described their language as 'barbarian', implying it was non-Greek, yet its specifics remain unknown. This has led to speculation that the Pelasgians spoke a pre-Indo-European language, or possibly a variety of languages reflecting their widespread geographical distribution. Culturally, they are thought to have influenced the developing Greek culture, with some Greek practices and deities possibly having Pelasgian origins. Their language remains a topic of extensive speculation, with various theories suggesting connections to Indo-European, Anatolian, or even non-Indo-European roots.

Regarding the influence of Anatolian languages on Greek, there is evidence of cultural and linguistic exchanges across the Aegean in the ancient world. However, the exact nature and extent of these influences, particularly regarding the development of Greek language and culture, are still subjects of ongoing research and debate.

Archaeological Evidence

Archaeological evidence regarding the Pelasgians is sparse and often indirect. Excavations in regions traditionally associated with them, like Lemnos, Thessaly, and Attica, have unearthed settlements and artifacts suggesting a Neolithic presence. However, unequivocally linking these findings to the Pelasgians is challenging, primarily due to the absence of inscriptions or distinct cultural markers that can be conclusively attributed to them.

Literary References

Literary references to the Pelasgians are found in the works of Homer, Herodotus, Thucydides, and other ancient authors. These accounts are often ambiguous and contradictory, sometimes describing the Pelasgians as barbaric, other times as Greeks. They are mentioned in various contexts, including their participation in the Trojan War and their widespread settlements across the Aegean region.

The paradox of the Pelasgians lies in their simultaneous omnipresence and obscurity in ancient Greek records. They are everywhere and nowhere, a people whose absence is just as important as their presence, according to Homer, Herodotus, and scholars throughout history. Their role in the formation of Greek identity, their linguistic contributions, and their cultural practices are subjects of ongoing academic debate and fascination.

DNA Evidence and the Pelasgian-Anatolian Connection in the Aegean Neolithic Tapestry

Finding Neolithic DNA in the Greek mainland, Crete, and Anatolia shows a link between the Pelasgians and people from Anatolia. This is an interesting mix of archaeogenetics, linguistics, and cultural history that sheds light on the complex web of ancient civilizations in the Aegean and Near Eastern areas.

The discovery of similar Neolithic DNA across regions inhabited by these ancient groups suggests a significant level of genetic continuity that spans across geographical boundaries. This genetic similarity indicates that the populations on the Helladic mainland, Crete, and Anatolia shared common ancestors during the Neolithic period, highlighting a deeper prehistoric connection that predates the emergence of distinct cultural and linguistic identities known from later historical periods.

Turning to Colin Renfrew's Anatolian hypothesis, it postulates that Anatolia was the place where Indo-European languages first spread during the Neolithic era. This theory aligns with the genetic evidence of shared ancestries, suggesting that as Neolithic farmers from Anatolia migrated into Europe, they brought with them the proto-Indo-European language, which would later diversify into various language families, including Greek. If the Pelasgians were indeed part of this widespread Neolithic population, as suggested by the genetic evidence, it could imply that they were either speakers of a proto-Indo-European language or were influenced by the linguistic changes brought about by these migrations.

Furthermore, the concept of a pre-Greek linguistic substrate refers to the influence of non-Greek, possibly indigenous, languages on the Greek language as it developed. The presence of non-Indo-European or proto-Indo-European elements in Greek, some of which might be traced back to the Pelasgian language (if it indeed was distinct from Greek), could be a remnant of these early linguistic interactions. This substrate could potentially be linked to the languages spoken in Anatolia, reflecting a complex web of cultural and linguistic exchanges over millennia.

Neolithic DNA evidence shows that the Pelasgians and Anatolian people had genetic, cultural, and linguistic links. These links suggest that these ancient groups were connected and interacted with each other. The Anatolian hypothesis and the idea of a pre-Greek linguistic substrate make for a strong framework for understanding these connections. They suggest that the roots of ancient Greek civilization and Indo-European languages may be much more connected to their Neolithic ancestors in Anatolia than was previously thought. These findings not only challenge our understanding of ancient ethnic and linguistic identities but also highlight the fluid and interconnected nature of human societies in the ancient world.

Theories and Speculations

The lack of concrete information has led to various theories and speculations about the Pelasgians. These range from considering them the bearers of a pre-Greek, possibly Anatolian or Thracian culture, to theories proposing them as a branch of the wider Indo-European family. Some modern scholars view them as a cultural and linguistic conglomerate, representing the diverse ethnic and linguistic landscape of the pre-Hellenic Aegean and Balkan regions.

In conclusion, the Pelasgians, as elusive as they are intriguing, represent a pivotal piece in the puzzle of ancient Mediterranean civilizations. Their study offers a fascinating glimpse into the complexities of cultural identity, linguistic evolution, and historical interpretation in one of the most historically significant regions of the ancient world.

Galatia - The Celts of Anatolia

The celts are a group of people that are usually linked with western Europe. However, how and why did the Celts end up in Anatolia? Watch the video for more!

Beautiful ancient artwork found under 2,000-year-old volcanic ash

In 2018, archaeologists made an astonishing discovery in the ancient city of Pompeii. A remarkable work of art was unearthed, shedding new light on the rich history and culture of this fascinating archaeological site.

A worker carefully brushed away 2000-year-old volcanic ash to reveal a fresco, or watercolor wall painting. It depicts the myth of Leda and the Swan.

In the story, the God Jupiter takes the form of a swan and impregnates a mortal woman, named Leda.

The scene has been depicted in various ways throughout the centuries.

According to the lead archaeologist at Pompeii, scenes of Leda and the Swan were fairly common in the city's houses.

This particular depiction stands out because, "Leda watches the spectator with a sensuality that's absolutely pronounced."

After being hidden for nearly two millennia, it's a scene that can appreciated again.

The city of Pompeii was destroyed in A.D. 79 when Mt. Vesuvius had a catastrophic volcanic eruption.

Archaeological work at Pompeii has been going on for centuries — but a recent renewed push has revealed several fascinating finds, including skeletons and pottery.

The Story of Hannibal: The Nightmare of the Roman Empire

For nearly two decades, Hannibal fought the Romans. He invaded Italy and forced Rome to battle for its very survival. Every army sent against him perished, with Hannibal employing a set of stratagems and tactics to outmaneuver and defeat his superior foe.

In the video below we will explore the story of Hannibal, who is considered to be the nightmare of the Roman Empire. Enjoy!

The History of Thailand Explained in 5 minutes

Throughout their history, Thais have been known for their ability to absorb foreign impacts and translate them into something uniquely Thai. The culture, customs, and cuisine of modern Thailand represent a happy synthesis of many influences remaining at the same time faithful the core Thai values. 

In the following less than 5 minutes long video we will be explaining the history of Thailand. Enjoy!

The rise and fall of Italy’s warriors-for-hire

Dig into the history of the elite mercenaries known as condottieri, who were soldiers for hire for Italy's rich and powerful.

During the 14th and 15th centuries, mercenaries known as condottieri dominated Italian warfare, profiting from— and encouraging— the region’s intense political rivalries. As rulers competed for power and prestige, their disputes often played out in military conflicts, fought almost entirely by the condottieri. So who were these elite and conniving warriors? Stephanie Honchell Smith investigates.

The Khan Who Drank From The Skull of a Byzantine Emperor

The incredible true story of the Bulgar Khan Krum the fearsome, who defeated his enemy the Byzantine emperor Nikephoros I at Pliska in 811 AD, and made a wine chalice from his fallen foes skull. Watch the video for more!

In Granada, Spain, a new Muslim Andalusian cemetery was found

In Granada, a significant city in the Andalusia area of southern Spain, excavations carried out as part of a building's repair uncovered a centuries-old Muslim graveyard.

An archeologist works on human remains, presumably belonging to Muslims Cemetery from the Andalusian Islamic era (711-1492) found during an excavation in Granada, Spain on September 16, 2023.

The almost 700-year Andalusian Islamic dominion, which was eradicated during the reign of the Catholic Monarchs that followed, left behind traces that are currently being sought in and around Granada, the former capital of an emirate that ruled between the 13th and the 15th centuries and was the last known Muslim state in the Iberian Peninsula.

One of the eight Muslim cemeteries in the city was discovered during excavations on the property of a building in the ancient city center of Granada, in the region known as "Bab al-Fukhareen," or Potters' Quarter, according to archaeologist Amjad Suliman, who is researching the Andalusian Islamic civilization.

Suliman stated that two further cemeteries had also been discovered and that a total of roughly 150 Muslims were believed to be interred in the constrained space, adding that they had so far discovered the bones of more than 40 Muslims in the Potters' cemetery.

"Granada was the last place of refuge for Muslims in Andalusia, and the density of burials in the ancient graves unearthed here shows us how high the number of Muslims living at that time was," Suliman explained.

Suliman claimed they discovered three underground layers of graves and numerous pieces of pottery with Arabic inscriptions similar to those found in the Alhambra Palace, which was constructed in the middle of the 13th century in Granada. He also said they were able to determine the human remains belonged to Muslims by examining the manner in which they were buried and the objects around them.

Suliman said that Andalusia has required consulting archaeologists for construction and restoration projects since 1995.

"In the past, human remains found during construction works were either buried again in the ground and built on top of them, or thrown away. Especially in the last 20 years, these works have become much more organized ... done in a controlled manner."

"In the excavations carried out so far, when we count only the documented ones, the remains of more than 10,000 Muslims have been unearthed," he added.

Once their anthropological research is finished, the bones that have been excavated from floors of buildings or from pieces of land are interred in the region's present Muslim cemeteries.

Focus is brought on 8000 years of history revealed by the Tarradale Through Time Black Isle archaeology project

The most recent Cromarty History Society discussion was focused on the work of a trailblazing Black Isle archaeology project that involved the larger community and produced some exciting discoveries.

Tarradale Through Time excavating a Bronze Age landscape.

The Cromarty History Society's new season was inaugurated by Eric Grant's talk. He has been researching the potential for archaeology at the western end of the Black Isle, around Tarradale and Muir of Ord, since he moved to Ross-hire about 20 years ago.

His presentation painted a brief picture of how the region's archaeological legacy was discovered through six community digs, which revolutionized knowledge of the archaeology of the Black Isle and beyond.

Many members of the community participated in the Tarradale Through Time project and got to see how archaeology is conducted, from walking through fields that have been ploughed to find artifacts from ancient times to digging test pits and excavations that turn up unexpected findings and then interpreting the results.

Part of an antler harpoon found in an excavated shell midden.

Eric gave an example of how the project purposefully encompassed 8000 years of history and archaeology, beginning in the Neolithic with the entrance of the first farmers and continuing through the Bronze, Iron, Pictish, Medieval, and Post-Medieval abandoned communities. Good soil and relatively level terrain have historically made Tarradale an agricultural region, with rougher and less farmed country rising to the north.

This has affected how it was settled, how it was used, and what kinds of archaeological evidence were discovered. Axes, flints, arrowheads, pottery, stones, and shell middens are the principal "hard" objects that archaeology discovers that have survived. Since the soil at Tarradale is acidic, all traces of bones will be lost.

Tarradale landscape.

Eric's presentation was illustrated by aerial photos of crop markings, archaeology-related features, plans for rebuilding, and images of artifacts. There was a wealth of knowledge to absorb, and I also realized how mysterious some locations may be, leaving interpretation always up for debate. The area's continued habitation and land use are both obvious. Locals have been acknowledged with becoming more enthusiastic and interested thanks to the community effort.

Eric still has additional plans to carry out even though it is over. "We feel sure that we will be inviting him back again for further updates," a CHS spokeswoman said.

The next gathering will take place on Tuesday, October 17. Professor David Worthington will be the speaker. He will present a fresh interpretation of the Highlands before to Culloden based on the writings of Rev. James Fraser (1634-1709). The presentation will take place at the Victoria Hall in Cromarty and will begin at 7.30 p.m. Everyone is welcome.