ANCIENT FINDS IN AUSTRALIA AFTER FIRE SWEPT THROUGH DATED 6,600 YEARS AGO

Extra sections of an ancient aquaculture system built by Indigenous people in south-west Victoria thousands of years ago have been discovered after a fire swept through the area over the past few weeks.

Parts of the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape have been dated at 6,600 years old
Traditional owners are confident new sections of the eel-harvesting system have been revealed by the fire

The aquaculture system set up by Gunditjmara people was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List last year
The Budj Bim Cultural Landscape, which includes an elaborate series of stone-lined channels and pools set up by the Gunditjmara people to harvest eels, was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List last year.

Some parts of the landscape, which also features evidence of stone dwellings, have been dated back 6,600 years — older than Egypt's pyramids.

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TWO MEGALITHIC CULTURES WERE SEPARATE GROUPS IN SPAIN

A team of researchers from the U.K., Belgium and Spain has found evidence that two groups of people in Late Neolithic Europe living approximately 5,500 years ago belonged to two distinct communities. In their paper published in the journal Science Advances, the group describes their study of isotopes from two burial sites and what they found.

Several years ago, scientists studying the remains of two groups of Late Neolithic people living within four to six kilometers of one another in what is now the Rioja Alavesa region in Spain concluded that the two groups were actually just one group—they suggested the distance between the two groups was due to status and wealth. The researchers had come to this conclusion because of the way the two groups buried their dead. Those that lived in the foothills used caves. Those in the valley created megalithic gravesites. In this new effort, the researchers found evidence that suggests the two groups were actually separate communities.

The new work involved studying the molars of 27 adults who had been buried in the caves and graves—or more specifically, the isotopes they contained. Teeth, unlike bones, do not change their isotope signals as a person ages. That allows for tracking the lifestyle of the person under study, particularly the foods they ate.

The researchers found several differences in diet—the people buried in the megalithic graves ate more plants than did those buried in the caves, particularly when they were children. Conversely, those in the foothills ate more meat. Those living in the valley also had more cavities due to a diet richer in carbohydrates. Also, the children that had grown up in the cave community had more calcium in their teeth, suggesting they were weaned at a later age.

Taken together, the evidence suggests that the people in the groups lived apart for most, if not all of their lives, making them separate entities. The researchers suggest that the close proximity likely meant that people from the two communities interacted regularly, including sexually. They also note that it was likely that there were occasional violent encounters, as well—but not enough to justify building protective barriers.

EARLIEST MOSAIC IN THE WORLD FOUND IN TURKEY

A crude tiled floor laid down in geometric patterns, unearthed in a preclassical Hittite town in central Turkey, is the earliest-known mosaic in the world, reports Anacleto D’Agostino of the University of Pisa. Moreover, he adds, the settlement where the mosaic was found may be the lost Hittite city of Zippalanda.

Discovered during the excavation of prehistoric Usakli Hoyuk, the multichromatic patterned surface is in the courtyard of a public building – which archaeologists interpret to be a temple to the Storm God, D’Agostino writes in Antiquity, published by the Cambridge University Press. Made of stones of varying size and shape, the Late Bronze Age floor is also the earliest-known rendition in rock of geometric patterns.

Aerial photo, showing the postulated Storm God temple: the site of the mosaic is highlighted in yellow Usa kl Hyk Archaeologica
All the stones were laid flat, not quite touching one another, and formed geometric patterns in contrasting dark and light colors. The mosaic consists of three rectangular frames, each containing three rows of triangles of different colors, mainly white, light red and blue-black. Two stones are orange-yellow, D’Agostino notes. The mosaic was framed with perpendicularly positioned stones in white, black-blue and white again.

The mosaic and eastern wall of the building interpreted as a Storm God temple do not touch one another but have the same orientation, D’Agostino states: the mosaic’s frame runs precisely parallel to the wall. These two Bronze Age edifices are clearly contemporaneous, he concludes. Also, the building and mosaic are characterized by “high status architecture,” while later remains in the town (from the end of the Bronze and Iron ages) are not, lending to the theory that this town was Zippalanda – and therefore the temple would have been to the Storm God.

SUNLIGHT COMES TO QUEEN HATSHEPSUT'S SANCTUARY NEAR LUXOR

- Many tourists witnessed on Monday morning a rare phenomenon when sunlight illuminates the sanctuary area of Deir el-Bahari, which was built by Queen Hatshepsut in the arms of the historic Qurna Mountain, on the western mainland of Luxor. In statements, Ayman Abu Zaid, the head of the Egyptian Society for Tourism and Archaeology Development in Luxor city, Upper Egypt, said that this phenomenon comes among many astronomical events related to the sun and its orthogonal rays on ancient Egyptian temples and cemeteries.

He added that the sun shone on the area at 6:36:41 a.m. after arising from the horizon line by an arc length and poured its brightness after nearly five minutes. Then, the phenomenon of orthogonality began as the rays sneaked through the main gate of the Hatshepsut Temple in an also rare astronomical phenomenon that happens twice a year to mark the summer and winter solstices.

Tourists gathered to watch the spectacle that has endured for thousands of years of Egyptian history. The religious complex of Karnak, in Luxor, is the largest ancient religious site in the world. Egyptologists say the solar alignment at the God Amun sanctum at Karnak coincided with the illumination of his sanctum at the Hatshepsut's temple near the Nile town of Luxor.

The event marks the beginning of winter solstice, an astronomical event that occurs in the northern hemisphere marking the longest night and shortest day of the year.

EGYPT DRAWS FURY WITH ARTIFACTS MORE TO TAHRIC SQ.

Egypt's recent decision to transport ancient Pharaonic artifacts to Tahriri Square, the epicenter of Egypt's so-called Arab Spring uprising in 2011, has fueled fresh controversy over the government's handling of its archaeological heritage.

Cairo has some of the worst air pollution in the world, according to recent studies. Archaeologists and heritage experts fear vehicle exhaust will damage the four ram-headed sphinxes and an obelisk, currently en route to their new home in Tahrir Square.

"The sphinxes are made of sandstone, they are part of the dry environment in Luxor, when they would be moved to Tahrir Square with all the pollution, they will deteriorate as a result of the reactions with the carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide in the air," Hanna told The Associated Press.

Tahrir Square was the epicenter of Egypt's so-called Arab Spring uprising in 2011. The square also contains the Egyptian Museum.

A centerpiece of the new museum is a towering statue of Ramses II. It once stood in a busy square near Cairo's main railway station, but was removed in the 1990s due to preservation concerns. The obelisk was recently moved to Cairo from the San el-Haggar archaeological site in the Nile Delta, the ministry said.

So. Africa 170,000 years ago early find

According to a statement released by the University of the Witwatersrand, researchers including scientists Lyn Wadley and Christine Sievers have found evidence that early modern humans collected and cooked starchy plant parts known as rhizomes some 170,000 years ago.

The charred rhizomes were recovered from fireplaces and ash dumps at South Africa’s Border Cave, which is located in the Lebombo Mountains, and identified with a scanning electron microscope as Hypoxis, a plant also known as the Yellow Star flower. The researchers suggests that a wooden digging stick discovered in the cave may have been used to dig such rhizomes out of the ground.

Wadley also explained that cooking the rhizomes would have made them easier to peel and digest. She thinks that since the rhizomes were cooked in the cave, rather than in the field, they may have been shared with others who shared the cave as a home base. Today, the plant is still valued for the nutrition, energy, and fiber it provides.