The work that has lasted three weeks have also brought to light several tombs and a Roman Christian who, according to experts, could belong to some bishops or individuals from that epoch

An ancient Roman temple, discovered following the first excavations in the chancel of the church of Sant Feliu Girona.

The temple, with cross-shaped plan, apse, three naves and two side chapels, and several tombs from the sixth and seventh centuries, have appeared

This intervention is part of the European project “Sopra e sotto. Euopea La Città”, the culture program involving the City of Brindisi (Italy) as main organizer, with participation as members of L’Ecole Nationale Superiore d ‘ Architetture of Toulouse (France), the University and the city of Girona. Read the rest of this entry »

The rich and famous people of ancient Egypt lived a decadent lifestyle with fine wine, sex, high fashion, and plenty of partying. How do they compare with their equivalents today - the modern western celebrity set?

The main differences might be regarding who were the richest people then, and who are the richest people now. In ancient Egypt the pharaoh was at the top of the ‘pyramid’ and his family, noble people who owned land, and the priests came after. Scribes, architects and doctors were well off, and skilled craftsmen also had many privileges.

Peasants and unskilled workers were low down the scale of Egyptian society, but it was the servants and slaves that skirted the bottom of the class pyramid. Those working in mines and quarries were really asking for trouble, as diseases, physical strain and dangers lurked in every turned stone in the desert. Slaves working in rich domestic environments were the lucky ones as they were assured security, housing and food. Many of these endured hard physical work and usually died young as we can see from the osteological remains found at Amarna site analyzed by Dr. Jerome Rose which proved that people building those megalomaniac buildings for Akhenaton died young with severe bone lesions. Read the rest of this entry »

Art historian Holly Pittman analyzes the oldest seal found on the Arabian Peninsula.

In 2008, a soil-survey team was working on a barren dune field in the Western Region of Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. On the surface of the sands, at a place that had been recently disturbed by herders and livestock, the surveyors picked up a two-centimeter, minutely inscribed cylinder. No potshards or any other signs of pre-modern habitation were found. In the journal Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy, Penn professor Holly Pittman (with archaeologist Daniel Potts from the University of Sydney) describes and discusses the find in an article titled “The Earliest Cylinder Seal in the Arabian Peninsula.”

Pittman is a professor of art history and curator in the Near East Section of the Penn Museum. She has participated in excavations in Cyprus, Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran, where she worked for several seasons on digs at Jiroft. Pittman examines ancient artworks and uses them to reconstruct patterns of thought and cultural development as well as historical interactions among the earliest cultures of the Near East. Her books include Art of the Bronze Age: Southeastern Iran, Western Central Asia, and the Indus Valley, Ancient Art in Miniature: Near Eastern Seals from the Collection of Martin and Sarah Cherkasky, The Glazed Steatite Glytic Style: The Structure and Function of an Image System and contributions to the catalog Treasures from the Royal Tombs of Ur. Read the rest of this entry »

While the grandeur of the ancient Greco-Roman city of Gadara in the north draws busloads of tourists, the distinctive architecture of the quaint Ottoman village of Umm Qais remains a treasure off the beaten path.

The village, situated on the eastern slope of the site, features squat buildings with vibrant facades and multi-coloured stonework in fashion at the time.

Far removed from the bustling centre of power that was Gadara, a leading member of the Decapolis League, Ottoman Umm Qais was a frontier post, deriving its modern name from Mkeis, or frontier station.

The town’s strategic value and beauty derive from its location overlooking the Golan Heights, Mount Hermon, Lake Tiberias and the northern plains of Palestine.

Many of the neatly cut basalt stones of Ottoman Umm Qais were in fact recycyled from earlier settlements, a reminder of how the Kingdom has served for millennia as the crossroads of cultures, civilisations and empires. Read the rest of this entry »

The Egyptian pottery residing in the Ophelia Parrish art gallery is accompanied by a story about how it had been unearthed and nestled safely in those glass cases. Sara Orel, art history professor and temporary curator of the exhibit, told the story in her faculty forum presentation “The Garstang Excavations at Beni Hasan, Egypt” on Jan. 26 in Magruder Hall 2001.

Orel said she is intimately familiar with the pottery, on loan from The Royal Ontario Museum, because she wrote her dissertation in 1989 on the excavations performed by John Garstang in Beni Hasan, Egypt, where the pottery originated. She said she chose to focus on Beni Hasan because of its size and significance to the ordinary people of ancient Egypt.

“It has one of the largest and best-excavated and preserved sets of burials of people who are essentially part of the middle class,” Orel said. “I have always been interested in daily life, not kings or queens and historical artifacts, but more the archaeological material.” Read the rest of this entry »

A thousand-year-old temple complex (including a tomb with human sacrifice victims, shown in a digital illustration) has been found under the windswept dunes of northwestern Peru, archaeologists say.

The discovery of the complex, excavated near the city of Chiclayo between 2006 and late 2009, has injected a dose of reality into the legend of Naylamp, the god who supposedly founded the pre-Inca Lambayeque civilization in the eighth century A.D., following the collapse of the Moche civilization.

That’s because evidence at the Chotuna-Chornancap archaeological site indicates the temple complex may have belonged to people claiming to have descended from Naylamp—suggesting for the first time that these supposed descendants existed in the flesh.

The sophisticated Lambayeque culture, also known as the Sicán, were best known as skilled irrigation engineers until being conquered in A.D. 1375 by the Chimú, a civilization also based along Peru’s arid northern coast. Read the rest of this entry »

The family tombs of an high-ranking general of the Han Dynasty (202 B.C.-220 A.D.) was unearthed in northwest China’s Shaanxi Province, providing evidence to China’s military history, archaeologists said Friday.

The tomb in Weiqu Town of suburban Xi’an, provincial capital of Shaanxi, belonged to Zhang Anshi (?-62 B.C.), a major general of Han Dynasty and he was conferred the titled of Liehou, top level of entitled officials of the dynasty, after helping Liu Xun (91 B.C.-49 B.C.) to become the emperor, said Zhang Zhongli, vice president of Shaanxi Provincial Institute of Archaeology.

The identification of the tomb owner was confirmed by the archaeologists based on the discovery of the official seals and the seal carved with the family name Zhang from the tomb, which is only six kilometers away from the emperor’s tomb, Zhang Zhongli said.

The main chamber of ancient Zhang’s tomb, surrounded by more than a dozen of tombs, is 35 meters long and 24.5 meters wide, and has been robbed before, Zhang Zhongli said. Read the rest of this entry »

The archaeological discoveries of the excavation expeditions working at 17 archaeological sites in Aleppo city (north Syria) contribute to highlighting Aleppo’s role in the human civilization during various eras.

Chairman of the Ruins Excavation Section in Aleppo Ruins and Museums Department Youssef Kanjo pointed out that the Syrian-Japanese joint expedition working in Didarieh Cave, northern Aleppo, unearthed lots of stony tools dating back to the Yabroudi civilization.

He added that excavation works included the part returned to the Musterian Civilization, as hundreds of flint and bony tools were used by the Neanderthal Man, to whom the Musterian Civilization belongs.

The Lebanese-Syrian expedition working in al-Nabi Huri, in Ephreen area, discovered the city’s fence during the Byzantinean and Islamic eras. Kengo pointed out that the Syrian-Polish expedition working in Tel al-Qaramil, north Aleppo, discovered a circular bridge and number of circular adjoining houses and tombs dating back to the Bronze era. Read the rest of this entry »

The remains of an Iron Age settlement have been unearthed by archaeologists working along the route of a new £1.3m water pipeline in Kent.

Evidence of a dwelling, postholes, pits, ancient hearths and pieces of pottery were found on land in Pembury.

South East Water plans to lay a 4.6km (2.9 mile) pipe between Kipping’s Cross Service Reservoir and Pembury.

The archaeologists, who were employed by the firm to survey the route, will now record and preserve the finds.

The period known as the Iron Age took place in Britain between about 750BC and about AD40. Read the rest of this entry »

A 2,221-year-old silver coin dug up as part of a hoard is the oldest piece of Roman money ever found in Britain.

Dating from 211 BC and found near the Leicestershire village of Hallaton, the coin was uncovered with 5,000 other coins, a helmet and a decorated bowl.

Unearthed in 2000 by a metal detectorist, staff at the nearby Harborough Museum have only just realised its significance.

One side of the coin depicts the goddess Roma wearing her characteristic helmet while mythical twins Castor and Pollux sit astride galloping horses on the reverse.

David Sprason, Leicestershire County Council cabinet member for communities and well-being said: ‘Leicestershire boasts the largest number of Iron Age coins ever professionally excavated in Britain. Read the rest of this entry »