Newsdesk Archive

Jiroft, Kerman prov, Jan 30, IRNA -- A brick tablet unearthed in the vicinity of Jiroft proves that the civilization of the area along Halilroud river near the city of Jiroft dates back to he first half of the third millennium BC. An archaeologist from the US University of Pennsylvania, Professor Holly Pittman, told IRNA here Monday that the issue had been declared at the area by the Iranian archaeologist and head of archaeological delegation, Professor Yousef Majidzadeh, last year. Pittman added that the tablet had been unearthed in the process of this year's excavations at Halilroud historical site on January 27. According to Professor Majidzadeh, the manuscripts on the brick tablet have been identified to belong to the Ilamid era. "The most distinguished Ilamid script dating back to the second half of the third millennium BC has been discovered in Susa. "The most ancient type of it known as preliminary Ilamid script has been produced about 3,000 years BC," he added.

PICTURESQUE ruins near a remote village once housed the political powerhouse and religious capital of Wales, archaeologists have revealed. Experts from the University of Wales, Lampeter, say the abbey at Strata Florida was once a city of light to rival Westminster Cathedral and Oxford. Situated near Pontrhydfendigaid in rural Ceredigion, the abbey is now in ruins, providing the area with a place of outstanding beauty. There are rumours it once held the most sacred of all icons, the Holy Grail, but there were very few other clues as to its hugely important past. Now work by archaeologists, led by Professor David Austin, has revealed the ruins were once 10 times the size they now appear. And deciphering names of farms over a wide radius has helped uncover the true scale of a massive monastic operation on the site hundreds of years ago.

The remains of a fifth century BC temple, whose carvings conjured the golden age of Athens, is the subject of a row between potential developers and conservationists. With Greece's powerful Central Archaeological Council (Kas) pondering whether to allow building on the site, conservationists fear one of Athens's most sacred places is headed for extinction. The Ionic temple was dedicated to the goddess Artemis Agrotera (the huntress). "Sites like this are part of a world heritage that go way beyond the borders of a country," said Iosif Efremidis, an architect heading the campaign to stop bulldozers moving in.

Hundreds of tremors off the coast of Ecuador in the past 11 days have sparked fears that a bigger quake could strike soon. "This isn't normal," the director of Geophysics Institute at the National Polytechnic School, Hugo Yepez, told Reuters on Monday, "This area is capable of producing big earthquakes. Very big earthquakes." About 320 tremors of more than 4.0 on the Richter scale have shaken the Pacific Ocean off the port of Manta since January 20. So far no one has been reported hurt but some small fishing villages have seen damages. An earthquake measured at 7.9 on the Richter scale battered the Pacific city of Guayaquil in 1942, although fragmentary reports from the time did not mention casualties.

THE president of Italy, Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, has returned a golden mask to the Republic of Peru. The mask, belonging to a pre-Incan culture, was found in a clandestine excavation in the 1980s, and consequently smuggled out of the country. In 1982 this death mask, measuring approximately 30 by 50 centimeters, was purchased by an Italian collector for 12 million liras, and was subsequently placed on sale on the Internet for a price ranging from $90,000-170,000, according to AFP.

Archaeologists have unearthed a unique site in Kent which they claim contains the best preserved examples of Bronze Age skeletons. The discovery was made in a six-month excavation of a plot of land in Ramsgate, which is due to be the site of a new housing development. The location has not been revealed because of its national importance. Archaeologist Darren Godden said the find would help explain what happened to human remains during the Bronze Age.

Paris - French customs officials have seized 845 African archaeological objects, including 70-million-year-old dinosaur fossils and rare figurines, destined for possible resale in Belgium, the government said on Saturday. The French Finance Ministry said in a statement that the objects were part of a 503kg cargo sent from Niger in north Africa and falsely declared as "artisan products". They comprised just over a hundred 70-million-year-old dinosaur bones, 668 stone objects dating back to the Neolithic period (8 000-6 000 years BC), and 29 pieces of pottery and rare figurines likely to have been used in funeral ceremonies by inhabitants of the Bura region between Niger and Burkina Faso in the second to 10th centuries. Bura figurines are on the International Council of Museums's red list of objects which have borne the brunt of pillage and theft. The export or sale of such objects is prohibited.

Paris - French customs officials have seized 845 African archaeological objects, including 70-million-year-old dinosaur fossils and rare figurines, destined for possible resale in Belgium, the government said on Saturday. The French Finance Ministry said in a statement that the objects were part of a 503kg cargo sent from Niger in north Africa and falsely declared as "artisan products". They comprised just over a hundred 70-million-year-old dinosaur bones, 668 stone objects dating back to the Neolithic period (8 000-6 000 years BC), and 29 pieces of pottery and rare figurines likely to have been used in funeral ceremonies by inhabitants of the Bura region between Niger and Burkina Faso in the second to 10th centuries. Bura figurines are on the International Council of Museums's red list of objects which have borne the brunt of pillage and theft. The export or sale of such objects is prohibited.

GENEVA (AFP) - Swiss researchers have uncovered a rare exchange of letters written in ancient Greek during the fifth century in what is now the Gaza Strip (news - web sites), the University of Fribourg said. The discovery offers proof of a rich intellectual society in a region that is better known today for a bitter and bloody standoff between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (news - web sites), said one of the researchers, Professor Jacques Schamp. Located amid mounds of manuscripts stored at the Marciana National Library in Venice and the French National Library in Paris, the unpublished texts from an ancient school of philosophy in Gaza were identified after a one-year search, he told AFP. "They have helped us to learn about people that we knew nothing about until now," said Schamp, who conducted the work with his assistant doctor Eugenio Amato. The oldest discovery is an exchange of letters between a philosopher called Procopius of Gaza who lived around the years 465 to 529 and a young, and until now unknown, lawyer called Megethios.

A new service has been launched to advise farmers and estate managers in North Yorkshire how to preserve important ancient sites on their land. The county council has appointed Linda Smith to the new post of rural archaeologist. She will advise on how land can be farmed without damaging historic landscape features. "It's not about digging but finding out what is there and how to preserve it for future generations," Ms Smith said.

Landscape burning by ancient hunters and gatherers may have triggered the failure of the annual Australian Monsoon some 12,000 years ago, resulting in the desertification of the country's interior that is evident today, according to a new study. University of Colorado at Boulder Professor Gifford Miller said the study builds on his research group's previous findings that dozens of giant animal species went extinct in Australia roughly 50,000 years ago due to ecosystem changes caused by human burning. The new study indicates such burning may have altered the flora enough to decrease the exchange of water vapor between the biosphere and atmosphere, causing the failure of the Australian Monsoon over the interior. "The question is whether localized burning 50,000 years ago could have had a continental-scale effect," said Miller, a fellow at CU-Boulder's Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research. "The implications are that the burning practices of early humans may have changed the climate of the Australian continent by weakening the penetration of monsoon moisture into the interior."

MEXICO CITY -- Scientists on Tuesday announced the discovery of the remains of 10 people, one dating back to 1,300 B.C., providing evidence of prehispanic cultures in Mexico City's sprawling Chapultepec Park. The scientists said at a news conference that they uncovered eight bodies last year near the park's Chapultepec Castle. Two other bodies were discovered in separate places, one in 2000 and the other a few weeks ago, in the park's forest. It was unclear how they died. Archaeologist Guadalupe Espinosa said the discoveries were part of a project sponsored by the National Museum of History/Chapultepec Castle that has been investigating prehispanic cultures in the park.

An earthquake or volcanic eruption is likely to destroy a library of ancient books at Herculaneum, near Pompeii, before they can be excavated unless urgent action is taken, according to the founder of a new group based in Oxford. Scientists have discovered new ways to read 1,800 charred manuscript scrolls already found in the ruins of the so-called Villa of Papyri at Herculaneum, a city that, like neighbouring Pompeii, was buried in volcanic matter when Vesuvius erupted in AD79

The Eastern Rhodopes revealed an old-times funeral site obviously pertaining to an ancient Crete-Micenae cult dating 3,500 years ago. The demographic researcher Mincho Gumarov of Kardzhali has donated the local museum with unique finds of ceramics, bronze and silver. The artifacts from the late bronze epoch were found in the nearby Samara cave. The find's pertainence to the epoch of legendary Micenae derives from the found labris (short two-face ritual axe, characteristic of that civilisation) and a silver amulet of the cult to Mother Earth, as well as pieces of surgery utensils. Researchers suggested this finding confirmed some theories that the land of Eastern Rhodopes was once part of the Minoan culture and civilisation.

MEXICO CITY - It has long been a matter of contention: Was the Aztec and Mayan practice of human sacrifice as widespread and horrifying as the history books say? Or did the Spanish conquerors overstate it to make the Indians look primitive? In recent years archaeologists have been uncovering mounting physical evidence that corroborates the Spanish accounts in substance, if not number. Using high-tech forensic tools, archaeologists are proving that pre-Hispanic sacrifices often involved children and a broad array of intentionally brutal killing methods

Archaeologist Bertell "Bert" D. Davis, 62, whose fieldwork contributed significantly to knowledge and preservation of Hawaiian archaeological sites, died Jan. 16. He worked on many projects in Vietnam and Cambodia as well as in Hawaii, where he spent about 20 years on the archaeology of Barbers Point. He earned a doctorate in 1990 at the University of Hawaii-Manoa with a dissertation on his Barbers Point research. "He was a real hard case for doing extremely detailed professional work in the contract archaeological field -- often to the exasperation of employers, because he would insist that further work would have to be done and often run them over budget," said Bion Griffin, interim associate dean of the UH anthropology department.

SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic - Authorities said Saturday that more discussions are needed before a Spanish research team can examine a tomb purportedly holding Christopher Columbus' remains, setting back efforts to determine if claims that he is buried in Spain are true. The government initially had agreed to reopen the tomb on Feb. 15, but authorities later backtracked after the event was heavily publicized. Dominican authorities were upset with reports that researchers would do more than visually inspect the bones. The dispute over which set of remains are authentic has simmered for more than 100 years.

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. -- Scientists from Indiana University Bloomington and seven other institutions have unearthed skeletal fossils of a human ancestor believed to have lived about 4.5 million years ago. The fossils, described in this week's Nature (Jan. 20), will help scientists piece together the mysterious transformation of primitive chimp-like hominids into more human forms. The fossils were retrieved from the Gona Study Area in northern Ethiopia, only one of two sites to yield fossil remains of Ardipithecus ramidus. "A few windows are now opening in Africa to glance into the fossil evidence on the earliest hominids," said IUB paleoanthropologist Sileshi Semaw, who led the research. Semaw and colleagues also report new evidence that suggests the human ancestors lived in close quarters with a menagerie of antelope, rhinos, monkeys, giraffes and hippos in a northern Ethiopia that was far wetter than it is today. The environmental reconstructions suggest a mosaic of habitats, from woodlands to grasslands. Research is continuing at Gona to determine which habitats A. ramidus preferred.

ROME (Reuters) - After being buried in boiling mud when Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 AD, the ruined ancient city of Herculaneum is now being deluged with acidic pigeon droppings. The situation has got so bad that archaeologists have called in three falcons to scare away the hundreds of pigeons that have set up home in the once-vibrant Roman town. The birds will start work in Herculaneum next Monday and are expected to stay for at least a year. Maria Paola Guidobaldi, director of the Herculaneum excavations, believes as many as 400 pigeons a day visit the open air site, disfiguring exposed frescoes with their excrement, chipping charred roof beams with their beaks and nesting in the stuccoed villas.

Tokyo - A Japanese research team found "a perfect mummy" in an unrobbed Egyptian tomb believed to be more than 3 500 years old, the team's leader said. The mummy was in a sealed wooden coffin unearthed in the archeological site of Dahshur North in northern Egypt, said Sakuji Yoshimura, who headed the team from Tokyo's Waseda University. The mummified man was believed to be from a period 3 500-4 000 years ago, older than the era of Tutankhamen, the pharaoh of ancient Egypt who ruled in 1336-1327 BC, Yoshimura said, citing characteristics of the coffin.

Excited archaeologists are sifting through the contents of 150-year-old New Zealand toilets to get a better understanding of the everyday lives of early settlers. Although there is plenty of oral and written history, there are gaps which can only be answered by lifting the lid on the sanitary habits of pioneering families, they say. About 30 of New Zealand's leading archaeologists arrived in Wellington on Thursday to start a five-week project to collect and document information from historic sites along an inner-city bypass route.

A team of archaeologists looking for historical artifacts at the Rueter-Hess Reservoir construction site has found traces of huts used by nomadic tribes up to 5,000 years ago. Centennial Archaeology Inc., an archaeological surveyor out of Fort Collins last month found "shallow, basin-type structures" five feet below the ground's surface, said Chris Zier, owner of the company. The "saucer-shaped depressions," which are roughly 3 to 3.5 meters in diameter, were dug by tribes and covered by a crude brush structure made of sticks and other natural materials, he said. "These people were mainly hunter-gatherers, so they didn't stay in one place," Zier said. "But that doesn't mean they didn't live without shelter." Although the artifacts have not been carbon-dated, Zier said the excavation team has found spear points used in the Middle Archaic Period roughly 3,000 to 5,000 years ago. The artifacts are being tested in the Centennial Archaeology laboratory and more data will be available by the end of the month.

ROME - When the infamous emperor Nero fell from power in A.D. 68, weakened by military revolts, his successors decided no personal trace of his reign should remain. They covered with debris the giant and sumptuous Domus Aurea -- the Golden House -- that he built on a hill in central Rome. They replaced an adjacent artificial lake with the Colosseum.

Wooden and stone artefacts dating back up to 3,000 years found at a flood prevention site in Lincs have been described as "absolutely amazing". Archaeologists at the site near Lincoln have unearthed an extremely rare wooden bowl and a stone tablet. About 20 people have been digging at the site since November and have uncovered more than 10,000 items. The site is located on a major flood bank strengthening scheme on the River Witham near Washingborough.

The American Shroud of Turin Association for Research (AMSTAR), a scientific organization dedicated to research on the enigmatic Shroud of Turin, thought by many to be the burial cloth of the crucified Jesus of Nazareth, announced today that the 1988 Carbon-14 test was not done on the original burial cloth, but rather on a rewoven shroud patch creating an erroneous date for the actual age of the Shroud. The Shroud of Turin is a large piece of linen cloth that shows the faint full-body image of a blood-covered man on its surface. Because many believe it to be the burial cloth of Jesus, researchers have tried to determine its origin though numerous modern scientific methods, including Carbon-14 tests done at three radiocarbon labs which set the age of the artifact at between AD 1260 and 1390. "Now conclusive evidence, gathered over the past two years, proves that the sample used to date the Shroud was actually taken from an expertly-done rewoven patch," says AMSTAR President, Tom D'Muhala. "Chemical testing indicates that the linen Shroud is actually very old -- much older than the published 1988 radiocarbon date."

Ancient Egyptian mummy wrappings hide a number of frauds and flaws, which a high-tech, digital X-ray machine recently exposed among the collections at Chicago's Field Museum. The machine saw through a mummified cat dated to approximately 500 B.C. that contained only twigs and cotton. It also revealed mummification tools that someone accidentally left inside a real mummy, and it solved a 15,000-year-old mystery surrounding what is believed to be the world's oldest known mummy.

A growing number of scientists are challenging the sensational discovery last year of a new species of one-metre-tall intelligent humans whose 13,000-year-old bones were said to have been found in an Indonesian cave. According to some leading anthropologists in Australia, Indonesia and elsewhere, Homo floresiensis is not "one of the most important discoveries of the last 150 years" as was widely reported last October, but a pygmy version of modern Homo sapiens with a not uncommon brain disease. Now a leading critic of the Homo floresiensis theory is to send researchers to a village near the cave where the bones were excavated to measure an extended family group whose males may be just a few inches taller than the skeleton.

Turkish Cypriot daily KIBRIS newspaper (12.01.05) reports that a three thousand years old ancient tomb was discovered yesterday in occupied Karpass peninsula. The tomb, which is dated on the Geometric era (1050-750 B.C), was discovered in occupied Agios Adronikos village, during works for changing water pipes in the area. Three human skeletons along with twenty-five pieces of earthenware works of art were found in the tomb. Among the earthenware jugs were four pieces of decorated amphora, two wine jugs, three decorated plates, two bottles of perfume and one conical spinning wheel.

EARLY foundations of the town of Huntingdon are being unearthed in Hartford Road. The archaeological site - next to one of the oldest churches in Huntingdon - is currently undergoing an investigation by 10 county council archaeologists. Andy Thomas, principal archaeologist at Cambridgeshire County Council said: "The Hartford site shows early indication that it could possibly be the earliest foundations of the town of Huntingdon."

IRANDUBA, Brazil -- High along bluffs overlooking the confluence of the mighty Negro and Solomes rivers, super-sized eggplants, papayas and cassava spring from the ground. Their exuberance defies a long-held belief about the Amazon. For much of the last half-century, archeologists have viewed the South American rain forest as a ''counterfeit paradise" whose inhospitable environment precluded the development of complex societies. But new research suggests that prehistoric people found ways to overcome the jungle's natural limitations and thrive in large numbers. The secret, say the theory's proponents, is in the ground beneath their feet. The highly fertile soil called terra preta do indio, Portuguese for Indian black earth, was either intentionally created by these pre-Columbian people or is the accidental byproduct of their presence.

A southern Utah woman's property has turned out to be a graveyard for some ancient remains. An excavation crew digging the basement for a home Jamie Church is building in Parowan unearthed what is believed to be the 1,000-year-old remains of a Fremont Indian family, a man, woman and two children. ``It was kind of creepy, but I'm trying not to think that way,'' Church said. Digging stopped immediately when the bones were discovered, Parowan Public Works Director Kelly Stones said. Police were immediately summoned to the site when the first of four skulls was found.

An archaeological project will be carried out to conduct a DNA analysis on a dozen horse skeletons unearthed from ancient burial tombs in Shaanxi, an inland province in Northwest China. A joint Chinese and British team of scientists from the Shaanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology, Peking University and Cambridge University will undertake the project, said Li Gang, a Shaanxi Provincial Administration of Cultural Heritage official.

Rome - Researchers have discovered the hidden laboratory used by Leonardo Da Vinci for studies of flight and other pioneering scientific work in previously sealed rooms at a monastery next to the Basilica of the Santissima Annunziata, in the heart of Florence. The workshop rooms, located between the Institute for Military Geography and the Basilica, include frescos on walls painted by Da Vinci that have "impressive resemblances" to other examples of his experimental work, including a tryptich of birds circling above a subsequently erased representation of the Virgin Mary that "constitutes a clear citation of the studies by the Maestro on the flight of birds", according to the three researchers, Alessandro Del Meglio, Roberto Manneschalchi and Maria Carchio.

KABUL (AFP) - With each stroke of his paintbrush Shairazuddin Saifi watches the past come back to life, meticulously restoring a Buddhist statue which was broken by looters digging it out of the ground. "I feel proud when I do this because it is Afghanistan (news - web sites)'s history," Saifi says as he rebuilds the features of the Buddha with a solution of mud and chemicals, in a backroom of the Kabul Museum heated by a flickering wood stove. He points to a corner of the pre-Islamic statue, which has been reinforced with concrete. "The looters did this when they dug the statue up because they didn't know what they were doing. Then the local police brought it to us," he said.

No one knows much about the thousands of pod-like stone vessels, some taller than a man, which dot the landscape in northeastern Laos and are nestled next to bomb craters resembling golf course bunkers. The puzzle of the Plain of Jars remains today as intriguing and mysterious to archaeologists as it did when Madeleine Colani of France made the earliest known excavations of the area more than 70 years ago. "This is like the megaliths of Easter Island. Nobody really knows who the people were or why they were doing it," said Julie Van Den Bergh, an archaeologist consulting for UNESCO (news - web sites) on a joint project with Laos.

A Roman statue of Atlas -- the mythical titan who carried the heavens on his shoulders -- holds clues to the long-lost work of the ancient astronomer Hipparchus, an astronomical historian said Tuesday. The statue in question is known as the Farnese Atlas, a 7-foot tall marble work which resides in the Farnese Collection in the National Archeological Museum in Naples, Italy. What makes it important to scientists is not the titan's muscular form but the globe he supports: carved constellations adorn its surface in exactly the locations Hipparchus would have seen in his day, suggesting that the sculptor based the globe on the ancient astronomer's star catalog, which no modern eyes have seen.

Six months after its board of directors fired seven South Street Seaport Museum employees, including its archaeological curator and maritime librarian, the fate of its 2-million-plus artifact collection and its research library and archive remain uncertain. Blaming reduced attendance at the museum since 9/11 and a $1 million budget deficit, Seaport Museum chairman Lawrence S. Huntington said in a New York Times article last July that the cutbacks were necessary "to put this museum on a break-even basis." Among staff let go were archaeological curator Diane Dallal, who ran New York Unearthed, the city's only archaeological museum and conservation lab, and Norman Brouwer, curator of ships and marine historian, a 32-year veteran of the museum in charge of its library.

Derbyshire museum has been given £4.26m to expand its facilities. The money will be spent on building a centre of excellence at Creswell Crags, a limestone gorge which contains the country's oldest cave art. The grant has come from the Heritage Lottery Fund and will pay for a new museum and education centre telling the story of the Ice Age. Plans are now being drawn up, and if approved, work could start next year, with the centre opening in 2007.

Astronomers have identified the three biggest stars known to science. If they were located in the same place as our own Sun - at the centre of the Solar System - the stars would stretch out further than the orbit of Jupiter. The red "supergiant" stars are more than 1.5 billion km across, pushing the previous record holder, Herschel's "Garnet Star", into fourth place.

Two giant slabs of ice are about to hit each other in Antarctica, possibly with spectacular results, say Nasa experts. A 160km-long iceberg is heading on a collision course with a huge floating glacier in the sea near the US McMurdo Research Station. The B-15A iceberg should collide with the Drygalski Ice Tongue no later than 15 January 2005, though it is slowing. US space agency scientists are studying the iceberg's progress by monitoring satellite images of the region.

Museums may not be the first places to spring to mind when it comes to the uptake of cutting-edge technology. But David Reid finds hi-tech is playing an important role in bringing history to life in Italy. The problem with Italy's antiquities and culture is that there is simply too much. How do you conserve ancient and priceless artefacts at the same time as letting people come and see them? Technology can help solve both problems.

BULGARIA'S ancient Thracian heritage was thrust into the spotlight in 2004 with a number of key archaeological discoveries in the so-called "Valley of the Thracian Kings". A team of Bulgarian archaeologists, led by Professor Georgi Kitov, discovered a 2400-year old golden mask in the tomb of an ancient Thracian king on August 19. The mask bears the image of a human face and is made of 500 grams of solid gold. The discovery was made near the town of Shipka, in the heart of the Stara Planina Mountain. Dozens of Thracian mounds are spread throughout this region, which archaeologists have called 'the Bulgarian valley of the kings,' a reference to the Valley of the Kings near Luxor, which is home to the tombs of Egyptian Pharaohs. "The unique mask looks even better than the famous image of King Agamemnon, the Greek anti-hero described by Homer in the Iliad," Kitov said after making the discovery. "This is the first Thracian mask of solid gold ever found," he said. Previously, archaeologists had only found masks covered with golden foil.

XI'AN, Jan. 10 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese and British scientists are planning for the DNA analysis of 12 horse skeletons unearthed from the burial ground of a prominent duke who lived more than 2,500 years ago in northwestern Shaanxi Province. Archeologists with Beijing University and Cambridge University have used a professional database to process data collected from the skeletons, including the size and weight of the skulls, spinalcolumns and limbs. A Cambridge laboratory will be entrusted to carry out the DNA analysis, after the State Administration of Cultural Heritage of China gives the green-light, said a source with the Shaanxi Provincial Institute of Archeology who declined to be named.

The Cassini spacecraft's flyby of Saturn's moon Iapetus has revealed a bizarre geological feature in its images: a bulging ridge at its equator. Mission scientists have started to release detailed images of the moon's surface, which is sharply divided into a bright half and a dark half.

The Swift space telescope, launched in November, has seen its first gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) - the massive cosmic explosions it was built to study. The telescope detected its first burst on 17 December, only a few days after its instruments were switched on. On 19 December, the US space agency satellite caught three more. GRBs are the most powerful explosions in the Universe, releasing more than one hundred billion times the energy our Sun emits in a year.

The steps to the Apadana entrance and the doorway to the 2500-year-old palaces in Persepolis have been eroded by 1 to 2 mm. The erosion in the world heritage site of Persepolis has made the experts so anxious that they have begun a special study of the Achaemenid capital to find out about the reasons of the erosion of bas relieves and the other parts of this ancient site. "According to our studies, the traffic of visitors of which the number in some days goes up to 20 thousand is one of the reasons for the erosion of the floor of the steps and doorways in Persepolis", Hassan Rahsaz, a technician in Persepolis historical complex, told CHN.

A team of researchers briefly removed King Tutankhamun's mummy from its tomb on Tuesday and lay bare his bones for a CT scan that could solve an enduring mystery: was it murder or natural causes that killed Egypt's boy pharaoh 3 000 years ago? Tutankhamun's toes and fingers and an eerie outline of his face could be seen as the mummy, resting in a box to protect it, was placed inside the machine in a specially equipped van, parked near his underground tomb in the famed Valley of the Kings.

An animated piece on an earthen goblet that belongs to 5000 years ago was found in Burnt City in Sistan-Baluchistan province, southeastern Iran. On this ancient piece that can be called the first animation of the world, the artist has portrayed a goat that jumps toward a tree and eats its leaves. The earthenware found in Burnt City, one of the most developed civilizations dating back to 5000 years ago, show the images of goat and fish more than any other subject. It seems these animals were used more than any other by the people of this city. On this goblet, with a diameter of 8 cm and height of 10 cm, the images show movement in an intricate way that is an unprecedented discovery. Some earthenware found in Burnt City show repetitive images, but none of them implicate any movements.

Achaemenian engineers had been using pi number in geometry 2500 years ago. They used this mathematical concept in building the conical stone structures and columns in Persepolis. Pi representing the ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter is one of the most important discoveries in geometry. Mathematicians today still don't know the exact date when this number was first used. Many people believe that the Egyptians have been the discoverers of this number, and some consider the Greek as its discoverer. But new studies show that the Achaemenians were also familiar with this concept.

Almost everyone knows about the magi, the "wise men from the East" who herald the birth of Jesus with gifts of gold, frankincense and myrrh. But few realize that these three kings of Orient are not Christians or Jews, but Zoroastrians -- members of an ancient faith that not only survives to this day, but holds its national convention next week -- Tuesday to Saturday -- in San Jose.

A TEAM of archaeologists has helped unlock 2000-year-old secrets of an ancient tower described as one of the wonders of European archaeology. Mousa Broch, located on the island of Mousa in Shetland, is one of the finest examples of an Iron Age tower or broch. The impressive structure was used as a fortification when the islands were racked by warfare but was also mentioned in the sagas as an eloping lovers' hideout.

Customs officials of London's Heathrow Airport handed over 30 ancient artifacts to the Iranian Embassy in London on Wednesday. The artifacts were being smuggled into Britain but were confiscated by customs agents. Over 100 artifacts from the 5000-year-old Jiroft site in Iran's Kerman Province were discovered in two packages at Heathrow Airport last summer.

The remains of the only known Roman chariot racing track in Britain have been found under an army barracks being redeveloped in Colchester. New homes are going up on a 209-acre site where builders preparing the groundworks excavated what they believe is a race track nearly 2,000 years old.

New research has shown that the oldest civilization in the Americas was far more complex than previously imagined. Ancient Americans settled in the Norte Chico region of Andean Peru more than 5,000 years ago, abandoning hunter-gathering and quickly developing a society that featured monumental architecture, agriculture, housing and a barter-based economy, recent archaelogical excavations have revealed. The Norte Chico civilization existed for roughly 1,200 years from around 3,000 BC and spread to include 20 major residential centers across 700 square miles, according to the work of a team led by Professor Jonathan Haas of the Field Museum in Chicago and his wife Professor Winifred Creamer, an anthropologist at Northern Illinois University.

Egypt and Germany have been fighting for possession of her for 90 years but, because Adolf Hitler loved her, she remained in Berlin's Egyptian art museum. In a dispute as old as the land of the Nile itself, Egypt has repeatedly reasserted its claim to the wayward beauty it says is being held illegally in Berlin. The wayward beauty is one of the great masterpieces of Ancient Egyptian art -- the 3,300-year-old bust of 18th Dynasty Queen Nefertiti. Now she is on the move again. She will not be going home to Egypt. Instead, she will be moving across town to new digs, relinquishing her pedestal in a converted guard house in what used to be West Berlin for more royal surroundings in the heart of reunited Berlin. The wounds of post-war division are finally healing over, and the German capital's Egyptian art collection, one of the finest outside Egypt itself, is being brought back together at long last.

WILTSHIRE may have Stonehenge but now Cheshire has a wooden henge after archaeologists made the discovery near Chester. Researchers working at Poulton, on the Duke of Westminster's land, were amazed to find the Bronze Age burials they had been investigating were preceded by a much earlier 'ritual' presence. A circle of holes indicated the existence of the wooden henge together with a large hole in the centre which was potentially a form of 'totem pole'. Now Durham University is to undertake both soil analysis and the dating of wood fragments.

Mexico City - Mexican archaeologists reported on Thursday the discovery of a 2 300-year-old mummy of a female child along with some fabric, hair, feathers and plant remains in a dry, cold, high-altitude cave in the central state of Queretaro. Archaeologists received a tip about some human remains in the cave in a mountainous area known as the Sierra Gorda. They searched the cave, located about 2 900 metres above sea level, and found the girl's mummified remains, which lacked one arm. "This is one of the oldest mummies to have been found in Mexico," according to a press release from the Templo Mayor Museum, part of the National Archaeology and Anthropology Institute.

Archaeologists have unearthed well-preserved remains of early medieval buildings in Winchester, Hampshire. The dig is taking place at Northgate House, in advance of the planned redevelopment of the site. A series of walls have been discovered in the excavation, the biggest that the city has seen for twenty years. Artefacts from the Roman era that have also been found include a commemorative coin from 300 AD, a miniature set of scales, and a tool for etching.

Iran and France signed an agreement in Paris on Wednesday night to cooperate in archaeology. According to the agreement signed for Iran by Head of Iran's Cultural Heritage and Tourism Organization Hossein Marashi and for France by its Minister of State for Cooperation, Development and Francophonie Xavier Darcos, the French experts are to offer educational and training courses for their young Iranian colleagues. Marashi said that the French archaeologists who have been the first to carry out projects in Iran are still interested in cooperating with Iranian experts.

Long before the first Europeans walked on Kansas soil, Native Americans celebrated the prairie and its December night skies. In some cases, these Indians of more than a thousand years ago dug intaglios -- animal figures -- into trenches along hillsides across the state and built council circles for dancing and sacred ceremonies. The winter solstice -- Dec. 21 -- held tremendous significance to these prehistoric Kansans, said Sue Cowdery, registrar at the Holmes Museum of Anthropology at Wichita State University. While Kansans today may celebrate the winter holidays with the traditions of Christianity, Judaism and Islam, prehistoric Kansas tribes such as the Quivira honored this time in their own way.

Soldiers' bones in urns-evidence of a forgotten battle fought around 730 BC. Did these men perish on their island home of Paros, at the center of the Aegean Sea, or in some distant land? The loss of so many, at least 120 men, was certainly a catastrophe for the community, but their families and compatriots honored them, putting the cremated remains into large vases two of which were decorated with scenes of mourning and scenes of war. Grief-stricken relatives carried the urns to the cemetery next to the ancient harbor in Paroikia, the island's chief city and placed them in two monumental cist graves.

JERUSALEM (AP) - Experts advised world museums to re-examine their Bible-era relics after Israel indicted four collectors and dealers on charges of forging items thought to be some of the most important artifacts discovered in recent decades. The indictments issued Wednesday labeled many such ``finds'' as fakes, including two that had been presented as the biggest biblical discoveries in the Holy Land - the purported burial box of Jesus' brother James and a stone tablet with written instructions by King Yoash on maintenance work at the ancient Jewish Temple. Shuka Dorfman, head of the Israel Antiquities Authority, said the scope of the fraud appears to go far beyond what has been uncovered so far. The forgery ring has been operating for more than 20 years.

EAST WINDSOR -- About the time Stonehenge was being built, along what is now the Millstone River, a tribe of Native Americans set up a fall camp to prepare for the long winter months. They collected walnuts and acorns, fished in the river and hunted whitetail deer with spears, stocking up for months before moving on to more permanent winter camps. What they left behind remained buried for the next 4,000 years.

The Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA) will embark within few days on carrying out an emergency project to rescue the ancient sun boats, dubbed "Cheops" in the Giza pyramids area. The boats have been badly affected by the strong sun, especially by the ultra-violet rays which damage the organic components of the wooden hulls. SCA Chairman Zahi Hawas said the sun Boats Museum displays, among others, a boat which is the only one of its kind in the world. The museum's glassy windows allow the sun to penetrate directly into the body of the boat, a matter that exposes the ship to damage. Other museums in the world have only small windows that do not allow the sun rays to penetrate inside, he said.

ATHENS (AFP) - Hundreds of ancient objects from as far apart as Asia Minor (in modern-day Turkey), Greece, Egypt and Cyprus were discovered among the remains of a previously unreported, pre-Christian sanctuary on an uninhabited Greek islet in the Aegean Sea. Archaeologists conducting excavations on Despotiko island since 1997 uncovered, among others, a valuable statuette dating from 680-660 BC, statue parts, tools, weapons, pearls, even an ostrich egg, the Greek culture ministry announced Wednesday.

Conservation isn't just a buzz word; it is a responsibility for all of us who cherish Egypt's ancient heritage. Our winter 2004 season at Hierakonpolis is dedicated to translating this word into action as we begin the stabilization and repair of the imposing structure we call the Fort, actually the Ceremonial Enclosure of King Khasekhemwy and the oldest freestanding mud-brick monumental structure in the world. (This project is made possible through a grant from the World Monuments Watch, a program of the World Monuments Fund.)

A cataclysm 250 million years ago wiped out nearly all life in the Earth's oceans, and nearly three-quarters of the plants and animals on land vanished too. It was the greatest catastrophe the Earth has ever experienced - - but scientists who study such events are in sharp disagreement over what caused it. Was it the crash of a giant asteroid or meteorite that killed off so much life? Or was a violent surge of volcanism from deep within the Earth the deadly factor? The argument over sketchy evidence from the long-ago geologic time called the "End Permian" persists, and the contentious scientific debate will continue this week when the American Geophysical Union meets at Moscone Center, with nearly 11,000 scientists in attendance.

A theory that the ancient Mayans built their pyramids to act as giant resonators to produce strange and evocative echoes has been supported by a team of Belgian scientists. Nico Declercq of Ghent University and his colleagues have shown how sound waves ricocheting around the tiered steps of the El Castillo pyramid, at the Mayan ruin of Chichén Itzá near Cancún in Mexico, create sounds that mimic the chirp of a bird and the patter of raindrops.

Earliest Polyandria (Soldiers' burials) found in Greece offer clues to the rise of Classical Greek City-States and Phalangeal War Tactics. by Foteini Zafeiropoulou and Anagnostis Agelarakis Soldiers' bones in urns-evidence of a forgotten battle fought around 730 BC. Did these men perish on their island home of Paros, at the center of the Aegean Sea, or in some distant land? The loss of so many, at least 120 men, was certainly a catastrophe for the community, but their families and compatriots honored them, putting the cremated remains into large vases two of which were decorated with scenes of mourning and scenes of war. Grief-stricken relatives carried the urns to the cemetery next to the ancient harbor in Paroikia, the island's chief city and placed them in two monumental cist graves.

Archaeologists in the United Arab Emirates have found the remains of a 7,500-year-old man, the oldest skeleton found in the country, the official WAM news agency reported Monday. The skeleton was found buried on Marawah island, some 100 miles off the coast of the capital Abu Dhabi. The man was aged between 20 and 40 years. It was buried facing east, indicating a sophisticated community lived on Marawah, WAM quoted Peter Hellyer, executive director of the Abu Dhabi Islands Archaeological Survey, as saying.

Eleven small, golden reliefs have been unearthed at an archaeological dig somewhere in eastern Norway. Officials won't say where, because they think more of the 1,400-year-old gold objects will be found at the site. Professor Heid Gjøstein Resi with one of the small gold reliefs found in eastern Norway. The most intact object found in October depicts a couple, maybe the mythological figures Frøy and Gerd. "This is a tremendously unique and exciting discovery, the kind an archaeologist makes only once in a lifetime," professor Heid Gjøstein Resi told newspaper Aftenposten. Resi, who's tied to the Oslo museum housing Viking treasures (the Oldsakssamlingen at the Kulturhistorisk Museum), has been leading the excavation where the gold objects were found.

The Israel Antiquities Authority recently uncovered the remains of what has been identified as Kana in the Galilee, a settlement known from both Jewish and Christian traditions. Authority spokesperson said Tuesday that during excavations in the western section of Kfar Kana, an Arab Israeli village in the Lower Galilee, archeologists discovered building remains, household utensils, and a mikve (Jewish ritual purification bath).

A bold pattern of zigzags which may be the world's first known attempt at landscape painting, has been found in the aftermath of a devastating moorland fire. The crude carving by an unknown bronze-age artist is one of more than 2,400 historically important artefacts revealed by the scorching last year of a swath of the North York Moors, where until now only 30 scheduled ancient monuments have been designated. "It turns out to be an astonishing archaeological landscape," said Nick Redfern, regional inspector of ancient monuments for English Heritage, who was left open-mouthed when the hidden treasures of Fylingdale Top were revealed, near the Anglo-American Star Wars defence base.

Durango - A group of archaeologists is accusing officials at Mesa Verde National Park of keeping titles off of the park's bookstore shelves for containing the term "Anasazi," a term widely used for the ancestral American Indians of the Four Corners region. Some tribes object to the term.

EAST WINDSOR -- About the time Stonehenge was being built, along what is now the Millstone River, a tribe of Native Americans set up a fall camp to prepare for the long winter months. They collected walnuts and acorns, fished in the river and hunted whitetail deer with spears, stocking up for months before moving on to more permanent winter camps. What they left behind remained buried for the next 4,000 years.

In a remote village in southwestern Italy, Kostalena Michelaki stands over an open flame firing pots as would have been done more than seven thousand years ago.

Conservation isn't just a buzz word; it is a responsibility for all of us who cherish Egypt's ancient heritage. Our winter 2004 season at Hierakonpolis is dedicated to translating this word into action as we begin the stabilization and repair of the imposing structure we call the Fort, actually the Ceremonial Enclosure of King Khasekhemwy and the oldest freestanding mud-brick monumental structure in the world. (This project is made possible through a grant from the World Monuments Watch, a program of the World Monuments Fund.)

SOFIA (bnn)- Archaeologists in central Bulgaria discovered remains of an 8, 300 year-old New Stone Age settlement, a report said Monday. To read the whole story, you need to have a valid subscription for the BNN Archive Services. Click the Login button and enter a valid username and password in the respective boxes.

Russian scientists are selecting volunteers to be locked in a capsule for 500 days to test plans for a trip to Mars. The mock mission is designed to simulate the tough conditions of a space trip to the Red Planet reports BBC online. A team of six men will be physically cut off from the outside world to test equipment intended to make them self-sufficient for long periods. Their capsule will consist of a bedroom, a kitchen and a laboratory.

Scientists believe humans still have gills which were internalised, rather than lost, after our ancestors crawled out of the ocean. A team from King's College London believe human parathyroid glands, which regulate the level of calcium in the blood, probably evolved from gills. The gills of ancestral marine creatures were also used to regulate calcium levels, says a report in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Scientists hope stem cell research could cure deafness in just ten years. Researchers from Sheffield University are using human embryo cells in an effort to grow new cells in the inner ear reports The Sun. Study chief Dr Marcelo Rivolta said: "We're very optimistic. It may be possible to do human trials in three to four years." Recently scientists said that eye stem cells may cure those with poor sight.

The riddle of the Sphinx has confounded generations of tourists and experts alike. Who built it, why, and what does it mean? Now a leading Egyptologist believes that he has pieced together the puzzle. After researching the pyramids of the Giza Plateau and their imposing half-human, half-animal guardian for 20 years, Vassil Dobrev of the French Archaeological Institute in Cairo has concluded that the Sphinx was the work of a forgotten pharaoh.

During a Dead Sea-area dig in 2002, Prof. Yizhar Hirschfeld discovered two small packages wrapped in cloth. The contents of one of them, just recently made public, was a scathing curse aimed at Israeli leaders. "Oh God almighty, I beg you God to destroy Ariel Sharon, son of Devorah, son of Eve." Thus opens a unique text, written in eloquent Arabic, on parchment found more than two years ago at the bottom of the Dead Sea. "Destroy all his supporters, loyal aides and confidants, and all those who love him and whom he loves among the human beings and among devils and demons," the anonymous writer continues with his curse.

ATHENS (AFP) - Hundreds of ancient objects from as far apart as Asia Minor (in modern-day Turkey), Greece, Egypt and Cyprus were discovered among the remains of a previously unreported, pre-Christian sanctuary on an uninhabited Greek islet in the Aegean Sea. Archaeologists conducting excavations on Despotiko island since 1997 uncovered, among others, a valuable statuette dating from 680-660 BC, statue parts, tools, weapons, pearls, even an ostrich egg, the Greek culture ministry announced Wednesday. The sanctuary was dedicated to ancient Greek god Apollo and was used as a place of worship from the 7th century BC to Roman times. Only the sanctuary's auxiliary buildings, but not the main temple, have been recovered so far.

PHILADELPHIA, PA, December 2004 -- Chemical analyses of ancient organics absorbed, and preserved, in pottery jars from the Neolithic village of Jiahu, in Henan province, Northern China, have revealed that a mixed fermented beverage of rice, honey, and fruit was being produced as early as 9,000 years ago, approximately the same time that barley beer and grape wine were beginning to be made in the Middle East.

The U.S- Egyptian excavation committee unearthed an archaeological monument in the western desert. The committee asserted that the ancient Egyptians in the pre-history lived in Toshka. Culture Minister Farouk Hosni said that the excavation committee discovered some paintings which date back to eight thousand years ago. Zahi Hawas, Secretary of the Supreme Council of Antiquities said that the excavation committee also found some animal skeletons and cereal warehouses which confirm this historical fact.

A farmer ploughing his field in central Greece hit on an ancient Roman trophy dating from 86 BC, the culture ministry announced. Archaeologists have unearthed the lower part of the stone-made monument near the village of Pyrgos some 100 kilometres north-west of Athens. An inscription identified the finding as a trophy raised there by Roman General Sulla after his victory over Mithridates, King of Pontus - a kingdom on the Black Sea in Asia Minor. It represents the trunk of a tree like the ones on which Roman victors used to nail the equipment of the defeated after battle, the ministry said. Lucius Cornelius Sulla (138-78 BC) was an infamous Roman general who took the unprecedented step of marching on Rome with his legions. Mithridates (132 - 63 BC) invaded the Roman Empire and caused significant trouble for the Romans during the end of the Republic.

AN Egyptian archaeological team has discovered a group of 20 gold-coated mummies in the country's western desert, Culture Minister Faruq Hosni announced today. He said the discovery brings to 234 the number of mummies so far unearthed in the area called the Valley of the Golden Mummies, adding that excavations were ongoing in and around the site. Some bronze coins were also recovered from the site, explained Mr Hosni, saying ancient Egyptians buried the dead with money believing they would need it to pay for their passing to the afterworld. The Egyptian team also discovered a graveyard nearby, which experts said belonged to the relative of a high priest. A sarcophagus at the site appeared to have been robbed, they added.

"The first concrete evidence of the existence of John the Baptist has been found on site," 46-year-old Shimon Gibson told AFP. Gibson, who holds a degree from University College London and has written several works on Biblical archaeology, believes the discovery to be "the first archaeological proof of the historical veracity of the Gospels". Other archaeologists, however, believe Gibson's conclusions go too far, and that the discovery of an ancient place of worship linked to John the Baptist does not prove that he actually existed.

BEIJING, Dec. 6 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese scientists say they have produced a submarine for underwater archeological research, as well as for underwater photography, seabed maps drawing and sea rescue. The Beijing Morning Post reports the sub is 1.23 meter, or about 4 feet long, operates at a speed of up to 1.5 meter per second and can work for two to three hours. Earlier this year, the submarine successfully helped archeologists study an ancient warship in south-east Fujian province.

ROME Rural populations in the Near and Middle East usually assume that whatever archeologists say they are up to, in reality they are searching for treasure. An Italian archeological mission has been excavating Arslantepe, a remote ancient site near the town of Malatya and the source of the Euphrates in south-eastern Turkey, for more than 40 years. Comparatively little gold, in the form of small ornaments, has come to light at Arslantepe, but the site has yielded a wealth of information about the development of one of the world's oldest urban civilizations, and an impressive list of "firsts": the first known palace, swords, toothed locks operated with a key and a princely tomb with what appears to be evidence of human sacrifice.

TEHRAN (Reuters) - These days Iranian women are not even allowed to watch men compete on the football field, but 2,000 years ago they could have been carving the boys to pieces on the battlefield. DNA tests on the 2,000-year-old bones of a sword-wielding Iranian warrior have revealed the broad-framed skeleton belonged to woman, an archaeologist working in the northwestern city of Tabriz said on Saturday. "Despite earlier comments that the warrior was a man because of the metal sword, DNA tests showed the skeleton inside the tomb belonged to a female warrior," Alireza Hojabri-Nobari told the Hambastegi newspaper.

The people of Mesoamerica are largely responsible for the golden corn we grow today, having domesticated tough teosinte grass thousands of years ago and bred it into modern maize. Researchers have now located the gene responsible for some of the traits that the Mesoamericans were selecting. The discovery should help scientists understand how plants develop, and reveals just how strict the ancient breeding regime for maize (Zea mays) must have been.

Ancient Pompeii, a 150 acre walled city in southern Italy, was destroyed and covered by volcanic material when nearby Mt. Vesuvius erupted in AD 79. A complete city block, once inhabited by patricians, slaves and merchants, is now the focus of research and conservation by the Archaeological Sciences Department of the University of Bradford. This film describes how the recently created Pompeii Trust is attempting to preserve this important piece of history for future generations.

NEW YORK -- Federal authorities on Wednesday returned to Yemen an antique Arabic tablet stolen from a museum there a decade ago that ended up at a New York auction house. At a ceremony in the Manhattan headquarters of the Department of Homeland Security, Yemen's ambassador to the United Nations, Abdullah Alsaidi, unveiled the alabaster plaque depicting a goddess of fertility, dating to about 350 A.D. in Saudi Arabia.

After almost three decades the ancient Egyptian tomb treasures of King Tutankhamun will be making a return visit to U.S. shores. A new exhibition, "Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs," (see artifacts from the exhibit, currently in Germany) will travel the U.S. for 27 months starting in June 2005. Stops will include the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Florida's Fort Lauderdale Museum of Art, and the Field Museum of Chicago. (See ticket information.)

A fresh theory on how Stonehenge was built has been tested out by a group of experts and enthusiasts. Gordon Pipes, of the Stonehengineers group of scientists and archaeologists, has suggested that levers may have been used to move the giant stones. They have tested his "stone-rowing" theory which involves a 45-tonne stone being levered on a track of logs.

Scientists in Brazil say they have uncovered a new species of dinosaur. The creature, identified from fossils, is thought to have lived more than 200 million years ago, making it one of the earliest dinosaurs known to science. The research team, from the University of Rio de Janeiro, says there are strong similarities with its creature and remains discovered in Europe.

The Huygens probe is on target and all set for its encounter with Titan, the mysterious large moon of Saturn. The 2.7m-wide robot lab has passed its final systems check-out and scientists have confirmed the rendezvous can go ahead on 14 January as planned. Huygens has spent the past seven years riding on the Cassini spacecraft, which arrived at the ringed planet in July.

Scientists examining images from the Cassini craft think they may be closer to showing there is liquid hydrocarbon on Saturn's moon Titan. Radar images of a strip of the moon, covering 1% of the surface, revealed dark patches which could indicate liquid methane or ethane. The images also show streaky areas of the surface could be caused by winds.