New Zealand’s Earliest Inhabitants

OTAGO, NEW ZEALAND—A new study of three groups of skeletons discovered in a cemetery at Wairau Bar suggests that the first group may have come from Polynesia to colonize New Zealand some 700 years ago. The ratio of isotopes in their bones are similar to those found in the Marquesas Islands in French Polynesia. The later groups of individuals probably grew up while covering a large area of New Zealand. “This is consistent with other archaeological evidence that the first settlers in New Zealand were highly mobile. That members of Groups 2 and 3 were still buried back at Wairau suggests that this village may have fulfilled both a ceremonial and home base function,” said Hallie Buckley of the University of Otago. Traditionally, Maori are buried in their ancestral lands.

China’s First Farmers

BEIJING, CHINA—An analysis of 5,000-year-old grinding stones suggests that agriculture may have begun in southern China before the arrival of domesticated rice. Huw Barton of the University of Leicester and Xiaoyan Yang of the Chinese Academy of Sciences found that the preserved starch granules represented freshwater chestnuts, lotus root, fern root, and palms. “The presence of at least two, possibly three species of starch producing palms, bananas, and various roots, raises the intriguing possibility that these plants may have been planted nearby the settlement,” said Barton. The presence of palm could explain the slow transition to rice as a staple food in the region.

The Nile River’s Fertile Gifts

ORLANDO, FLORIDA—The number of births for the Kellis community living at Egypt’s Dakhleh Oasis 1,800 years ago probably peaked in March and April, indicating that most conceptions took place in July and August, during the annual flooding of the Nile River. “Even though this was a Christian community, we know that they were still practicing, or having these social beliefs of, fertility being at its highest in the months of July and August,” said Lana Williams of the University of Central Florida. Her team examined the well-preserved remains found in 765 graves, including remains of individuals who died between 18 and 45 weeks after conception. This information was combined with the month of death, determined from the position of the graves, which were oriented toward the rising sun. They found that the death rate of women of childbearing age and infants was greatest in March and April.

The Bored Viking

OSLO, NORWAY—Outlines of a left foot and a right foot have been found in the floorboards of the Gokstad Ship, which was discovered in 1880 and is housed at the Viking Ship Museum. The ship had been buried in a grave, but its floorboards were not in place, so researchers don’t know if the carvings had been near one another while the ship was at sea. “My guess is that some time or another a person was bored and simply traced his foot with his knife. It’s a kind of an ‘I was here’ message,” said museum staffer Hanne Lovise Aannestad.

Were Neanderthals Capable of Abstract Thought?

BARCELONA, SPAIN—Archaeologists are working on obtaining new dates for the prehistoric paintings in Spain’s El Castillo Cave by measuring the rate of decay of uranium atoms in the calcite covering the artwork. The oldest of the paintings is thought to be at least 40,800 years old, about the same time that the first modern humans are thought to have entered Western Europe. The new dates could show that that paintings are even older, indicating that they were created by Neanderthals, who occupied the region for some 200,000 years before the arrival of Homo sapiens. Meanwhile, scholars continue to debate the complexity of Neanderthal cultural behavior, and whether or not it was copied from their Homo sapiens cousins. João Zilhão of the University of Barcelona thinks that Neanderthals and modern humans were “cognitive equals.” His goal is “to date pigments in these paintings to an age that is clearly and to everyone’s satisfaction beyond the range of modern humans in Europe,” he explained.

Bone Find Reveals Site of Lost Saxon Church

WALLINGFORD, ENGLAND—Construction workers uncovered a medieval skeleton at a home in southern England. The bones have helped archaeologists pinpoint the location of St. Lucian’s, a Saxon church and one of the oldest in the town. “St. Lucian’s Church pre-dates the Norman Conquest, so this is an exciting discovery,” said Judy Dewey, curator of the Wallingford Museum. The bones have been reburied in the home’s garden.

Possible Mi’kmaq Site in Path of Proposed Dam Upgrade

GASPEREAU LAKE, NOVA SCOTIA—Archaeological research and local tradition suggest that an ancestral Mi’kmaq burial ground rests in an area slated for an upgrade to a dam on Gaspereau Lake. The Assembly of Nova Scotia Mi’kmaq Chiefs has asked Nova Scotia Power for an independent engineering assessment of the proposed work because they would like the work to be carried out further downstream, away from the possible burials. “The proposed work is a requirement under the national dam-safety standards to ensure public safety. At the same time, we are doing all we can to ensure archaeologically significant sites are protected,” responded Dave McGregor of Nova Scotia Power.  

Salvage Excavations Conducted at Oregon Trail Site

EVANSVILLE, WYOMING—Archaeologists and volunteers have until Sunday evening to conduct salvage excavations at the site of Camp Payne, which guarded Reshaw’s Bridge, an Oregon Trail river crossing, during the 1850s and 1860s. “This is the first military post in this area,” said Carolyn Buff of the Wyoming Archaeological Society. The land has been sold by the town and will be turned into a housing development. “We’re going to do absolutely everything we can until Sunday evening, and we have to call it good,” added Wyoming State Archaeologist Mark Miller.

The Ancient Burmese City of Bagan

BAGAN, MYANMAR—There are some 3,000 temples, monasteries, and pagodas ranging from the ninth to thirteenth centuries in the ancient Buddhist city of Bagan. In 1975, while the country was ruled by a dictatorship, an earthquake leveled some of those buildings. They were restored and even new structures were erected with methods and materials that will make it difficult for Bagan to qualify as a UNESCO World Heritage site. Some scholars think the designation could bring much-needed attention to an area of the world that has been long-isolated and little-studied. “But it should not … expect the international community to endorse restorations which have so gravely violated basic archaeological principles,” adds author Donald Stadtner.

Underwater Archaeologists Survey French Warships

LOUISBOURG, NOVA SCOTIA—Underwater archaeologists are investigating as many as ten wrecks of eighteenth-century French warships in the waters off the coast of Fortress of Louisbourg National Historic Site. The ships sank during the second siege of Louisbourg in 1758. Most of what has survived are lower hulls, embedded in the sea floor. “A common thing we are seeing is cannons that were on the warships when they went down: cannonballs, cannon shot, bar shot—all of the kinds of ordnance that was on the vessels when they sank,” said Jonathan Moore of Parks Canada.

Warriors-in-Training May Have Killed Dog Companions

ONEONTA, NEW YORK—The chopped-up bones of 51 dogs and seven wolves have been unearthed at the Bronze Age site of Krasnosamarkskoe in eastern Russia. Dorcas Brown and David Anthony of Hartwick College noticed that the dogs, which ranged in age from 7 to 12, had been butchered in a very precise, but unusual, way. Marks on their teeth indicated that the dogs had all died during the winter months. Research into Eurasia’s early literature revealed that dogs were often associated with death and the underworld, and that dogs are also linked to a secret initiation rite for boys who trained to become marauding warriors. At the end of their training, during a midwinter ceremony, the 16-year-old boys ritually “died” and journeyed to the underworld. Then they painted their bodies black and wore dog-skin cloaks. Brown and Anthony think that the boys of Krasnosamarkskoe may have also had to kill their own dogs as the final step in becoming a trained killer.