The Great London:
Scotland

The discovery of a tiny, 170-million-year-old fossil on the Isle of Skye, off the north-west coast of the UK, has led Oxford University researchers to conclude that three previously recognised species are in fact just one.

During a fossil-hunting expedition in Scotland last year, a team of researchers from the University's Department of Earth Sciences discovered the fossilised remains of a mouse-sized mammal dating back around 170 million years to the Middle Jurassic period. The new find -- a tiny lower jaw bearing 11 teeth -- shows that that three species previously described on the basis of individual fossilised teeth actually belong to just one species.

The United Kingdom has yielded many important mammalian fossils from the Middle Jurassic, a period dating between 176 and 161 million years ago, with most being found in the Scottish Isles and around Oxfordshire. Indeed, specimens obtained from Kirtlington Quarry -- just 10 miles north of Oxford -- have provided some of the richest Middle Jurassic mammal records to date. Included among those are a large number of teeth, each found in isolation, that had been thought to include at least three distinct species of what are known as 'stem therians' -- ancient relatives of many modern mammals, including rodents and marsupials.

Now, though, the team from Oxford has discovered a fossil which refutes those claims. The team found the 10 millimetre-long fossilised jaw at a site on the west coast of the Isle of Skye. 'We spent five days exploring the locality, finding nothing especially exciting, and were walking back along the beach to the house where we were staying,' recalls Dr Roger Close, the lead author of the study. 'Then, by chance, we spotted this specimen on the surface of a boulder.'

After carefully removing the specimen -- a complete left lower jaw of a small mammal -- the team carried out a series of analyses to determine its origins. First, they performed a high-resolution x-ray CT scan at the Natural History Museum in London, providing an incredibly detailed 3D model of the fossil that allowed the researchers to glean much more information about its anatomy than could ever be possible by visual inspection. 'Over half of the fossil is still buried in the rock,' explains Dr Close. 'The CT scan allows us to virtually remove this, and explore the whole specimen in exquisite detail.'

From there, they systematically compared the shape of each and every tooth present in the jaw to those found in all similar specimens discovered in the past. They were surprised to find that the new jaw resembled not one species, but three: Palaeoxonodon ooliticus, Palaeoxonodon freemani and Kennetheridium leesi, all known from isolated teeth preserved in rocks of the same age from Oxfordshire.

Differences in tooth shape that had been thought to distinguish three different species were in fact all present in the single lower jaw found on the Isle of Skye. 'In effect, we've "undiscovered" two species,' explains Dr Close. 'The new find shows that we should be cautious about naming new types of animals on the basis of individual teeth.' In a paper published in Palaeontology, the team identifies their find as Palaeoxonodon ooliticus -- the name given to the first of the three species to be described back in the late 1970s.

Palaeoxonodon has long been recognised as an important species for understanding the evolution of molar teeth in modern mammals, and this latest discovery sheds more light on the subject. The species appears to show an intermediate step in the evolution of what are known as 'tribosphenic' molars -- a kind of pestle-and-mortar geometry that is particularly well suited to processing food.

'Towards the front, three sharp cusps allow the animal to slice up the food, while at the back a flatter, grinding surface crushes it,' explains Dr Close. 'It's an evolutionary innovation that allowed much more versatile ways of feeding to evolve, and it may well have contributed to the long-term success of this group of mammals.'

Source: University of Oxford [November 13, 2015]

Two golden torcs unearthed by a metal-detecting enthusiast are among the treasures on display at a major new exhibition celebrating the Celts.

A collection of Celtic art from all over Europe will go on display at the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh from Thursday.

It is the first major British exhibition on the Celts for more than 40 years and was last held at the British Museum in London.

Exhibits include two Iron Age neck ornaments famously discovered by David Booth in a Stirlingshire field on his first outing with a metal detector. The former safari park keeper netted £460,000 for the 2000-year-old find.

Other highlights include a reconstruction of a chariot from a burial excavated at Newbridge, Edinburgh, in 2001, and on display for the first time. Dating from 475-400BC, it is Scotland's only known chariot burial and the oldest in Britain.

Dr Fraser Hunter, principal curator of Iron and Roman Age Collections, said: "This is a once in a lifetime chance to see masterpieces of Celtic art from all across Europe.

"These allow us to explore connections and differences across the Europe of 2000 years ago, to think about what the idea of Celts means and to see the power that this art gave to objects which people cherished."

Many of the 350 objects on show have never been seen in Scotland, notably the Gundestrup Cauldron, a huge silver vessel from the National Museum of Denmark.

Dr Martin Goldberg, a senior curator at National Museums Scotland, said: "This exhibition has given us great opportunities to look afresh at our own material through new research and presentation, to display some exciting new finds from across Scotland and to work with exceptional objects from other national and international collections.

"The resulting breadth, variety and quality of objects tell us fascinating, occasionally challenging things about Celts."

The exhibition runs until September 25.

Source: STV [March 13, 2016]

Archaeologists have uncovered a 2000-year-old tomb believed to contain a wealthy father and son who were artisan weavers by trade and walked with the same “pigeon-toed” feet.

The men were laid to rest in an Iron Age stone cist close to the National Trust for Scotland’s (NTS) House of the Binns near Linlithgow.

One skeleton belonged to a man aged around 40 when he died between 92BC-65AD, while his relative was around 20 when he died some time later, 44BC-79AD, and his body was pushed in alongside him.

Skeletal analysis shows both men stood around 5ft 5in tall and suffered from worn teeth associated with weaving.

They also shared an unusual anomaly of the muscle attachment in the upper leg, which would have caused their legs to rotate inwards and made them walk with their toes turned in – pigeon-toed.

The older man was buried clutching an oval-shaped iron brooch to his left shoulder. Experts say it showed “incredibly rare” evidence of thread from his cloak.

NTS archaeologist Daniel Rhodes said the discovery was “exciting in its rarity”.

He said: “The first skeleton was an adult male, aged around 40 years, with wear on his teeth which suggests he may have been a weaver.

“The younger man was around 20 years old. They were intentionally buried in the same place and when you look at the date range they could be father and son.

“The younger man also suffered from worn teeth, and they both shared the same family leg deformity. There is no sign of disease so it probably didn’t cause severe damage or disability in life, but they may have been pigeon-toed.”

The House of the Binns is a 17th-century laird’s house overlooking the Forth, and home to the Dalyell family for 400 years.

The house was built in 1612 by Thomas Dalyell, an Edinburgh merchant who made his fortune at the court of King James VI and I in London. The Dalyell family gifted the house and surrounding parkland to the NTS in 1944, retaining the right of the family to live there.

The wider property contains archaeological remains pre-dating the establishment of the house and surrounding parkland. Iron Age burials are rare in Scotland, and ones with grave goods even rarer. Just 50 accompanied burials are known.

Mr Rhodes added: “There has always been folklore about Binns Hill being the site of a hill fort. The fact that there is this kind of status burial found at the foot of the hill, there must have been other activity going on in this period. It’s an absolutely perfect spot.”

Author: George Mair | Source: Edinburgh News [March 29, 2015]

How an Aberdonian would have looked around 750 years ago is to be reconstructed by one of the world’s top forensic anthropologists.

Professor Sue Black, director of the Centre for Anatomy and Human Identification at Dundee University, is in talks with city chiefs on the project after a mass haul of medieval skeletons was made in the city centre earlier this year.

Professor Black described it as a “fascinating project” and is due to create a 3D map to give an impression of how the city forebearers may have looked.

If the condition of the remains found underneath Aberdeen Art Gallery is good enough, a whole family could be reconstructed.

A bronze cast of the impressions could become the centrepiece to Aberdeen’s new art gallery complex, due to open in 2017.

Aberdeen City Council Leader, Councillor Jenny Laing, said the prospect of working with Professor Black elevated the gallery project to a new level.

She said: “Sue Black is the world’s leading forensic anthropologist and to have her engaged in this project elevates our work to a new level and opens the door to new possibilities.”

“These people pre-date Robert the Bruce and were alive when Henry III was on the English throne – it is fascinating to think that we could get a glimpse into their world and to consider how Aberdeen has changed through the centuries. The analysis that is being done will provide a unique insight into the people that have lived right here in Aberdeen centuries ago.

“It is all the more special to think that they are our forefathers.”

In March, 92 skeletons believed to date back to the 13th Century were unearthed from under Aberdeen Art Gallery during the £30 million redevelopment works.

It is likely that the discovery of the skeletons was linked to Blackfriars, a church and friary dating to around 1230 that was destroyed during the Reformation. Archaeologists found a collection of bones of at least 40 people in three coffins and a further 52 skeletons were found in individual coffins in their own graves.

Artefacts and treasures such as coins, coffin fixtures and textile ceramics were also found and are currently being analysed in London along with the skeletons.

Details on disease, war or famine in that time period are now being searched for.

Author: Alison Campsie | Source: The Scotsman [May 25, 2016]

The horticulturist who came up with the concept of ‘evolution by natural selection’ 27 years before Charles Darwin did should be more widely acknowledged for his contribution, states a new paper by a King’s College London geneticist.

The paper, published in the Biological Journal of the Linnean Society, argues that Patrick Matthew deserves to be considered alongside Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace as one of the three originators of the idea of large-scale evolution by natural selection.

Furthermore, Matthew’s version of evolution by natural section captures a valuable aspect of the theory that isn't so clear in Darwin's version – namely, that natural selection is a deductive certainty more akin to a ‘law’ than a hypothesis or theory to be tested.

Patrick Matthew (1790-1874) was a Scottish landowner with a keen interest in politics and agronomy.  He established extensive orchards of apples and pears on his estate at Gourdie Hill, Perthshire, and became adept in horticulture, silviculture and agriculture.

Whilst Darwin and Wallace’s 1858 paper to the Linnean Society, On the Origin of Species, secured their place in the history books, Matthews had set out similar ideas 27 years earlier in his book On Naval Timber and Arboriculture. The book, published in 1831, addressed best practices for the cultivation of trees for shipbuilding, but also expanded on his concept of natural selection.

“There is a law universal in nature, tending to render every reproductive being the best possibly suited to its condition that its kind, or that organized matter, is susceptible of, which appears intended to model the physical and mental or instinctive powers, to their highest perfection, and to continue them so. This law sustains the lion in his strength, the hare in her swiftness, and the fox in his wiles.”  (Matthew, 1831: 364)

In 1860, Matthew wrote to point out the parallels with his prior work, several months after the publication of On the origin of species.  Darwin publically wrote in 1860 “I freely acknowledge that Mr. Matthew has anticipated by many years the explanation which I have offered of the origin of species”, while Wallace wrote publically in 1879 of “how fully and clearly Mr. Matthew apprehended the theory of natural selection, as well as the existence of more obscure laws of evolution, many years in advance of Mr. Darwin and myself”, and further declared Matthew to be “one of the most original thinkers of the first half of the 19th century”.  However, both asserted their formulations were independent of Matthew’s.

Even if Matthew did not influence Darwin and Wallace, his writings provide a valuable third point of reference on the notion of macroevolution by natural selection, argues the paper’s author, Dr Michael Weale. Dr Weale has created a public website to act as an online repository of the writings by Patrick Matthew, including some of his lesser-known work.

Dr Michael Weale, from the Department of Medical and Molecular Genetics at King’s College London, said: ‘Whilst Darwin and Wallace both deserve recognition for their work, Matthew, the outsider who deduced his idea as part of a grand scheme of a purposeful universe, is the overlooked third man in the story. Matthew’s story is an object lesson in the perils of low-impact publishing. Despite its brevity, and to some extent because of it, Matthew’s work merits our renewed attention.’

Source: King's College London [April 20, 2015]

This special exhibition unearths the stories behind four skeletons from the Museum of London’s 20,000-strong collection and four from burial grounds across Scotland. This is a touring exhibition that, after Glasgow, will travel to Bristol and Leeds in 2017, displaying the Museum of London’s skeletons alongside bones discovered locally. In-depth analysis by experts at the Museum of London has provided insights into the health and history of each individual, helping to bring to life the stories that have long been hidden beneath the ground.

The skeletons on display in Glasgow reflect a rich and varied past, with individuals coming from diverse locations, both geographically and socially, and periods of time. Excavations have uncovered burial grounds across the UK, ranging from the Neolithic period through the Iron Age to Roman London and up to the 19th century. Each individual skeleton reveals aspects of their life and times, including fractures and trauma, multiple myeloma – cancer, the effects of syphilis, rickets or arthritis, and tooth decay.

Emily Sargent, curator at Wellcome Collection, said: “Spanning thousands of years and from opposite ends of the country and social scales, the bones of these individuals offer us a rare and special glimpse into history. Yet we identify with their rotten teeth or broken bones, and are reminded that skeletons can tell us more about what people lived with, rather than what they died from.”

Sharon Ament, Director of the Museum of London, said: “This is the first time our skeletons have gone on tour and really shows how museums at opposite ends of the UK can work together to show their joint collections. We can learn a lot from the bones of our ancestors, who all lived through very different versions of the London we know today, and this is a wonderful opportunity to share their stories alongside those of their local Scottish counterparts for the first time.”

Research carried out on the skeletons has helped shed new light on the grounds they were discovered in and the circumstances in which they were buried, from plague pits in urban London to the beaches of South Uist. Specially commissioned photographs by photographer Thomas Adank capture the sites as they are now, and will be displayed in the exhibition next to each skeleton, contextualising them as a reminder of the layers of human history all around us.

Jelena Bekvalac, Curator of Human Osteology at the Museum of London, said: “Research carried out on these skeletons has given us vital clues into the lives of these individuals, some of whom lived thousands of years ago. Putting them in context with where they were buried and what those sites look like now will mean visitors will have a real, tangible connection to these people. It is a unique opportunity for the skeletons from London to be displayed in Glasgow alongside their Scottish counterparts, and truly demonstrates the rich diversity of burial in the British Isles.”

Professor David Gaimster, Director of The Hunterian, added: “We are delighted to be working in partnership with Wellcome Collection and the Museum of London on this fascinating exhibition. ‘Skeletons: Our Buried Bones’ offers a unique insight into the way people lived, worked and died.”

‘Skeletons: Our Buried Bones’ is a collaboration between Wellcome Collection and Museum of London, touring to Glasgow, Bristol and Leeds over 2016-2018. It’s based on ‘Skeletons: London’s Buried Bones’, originally shown at Wellcome Collection in 2008 and is curated by Emily Sargent and Jelena Bekvalac. 

Source: The Hunterian Museum [August 18, 2016]