The Great London [Search results for Near East] 

The ice sheet covering Greenland is four times bigger than California -- and holds enough water to raise global sea-level more than twenty feet if most of it were to melt. Today, sea levels are rising and the melting of Greenland is a major contributor. Understanding how fast this melting might proceed is a pressing question for policymakers and coastal communities.

To make predictions about the future of the ice sheet, scientists have tried to understand its past, hoping to glean what the ice was doing millions of years ago when the Earth was three or more degrees Fahrenheit warmer than it is now. But our understanding of the ice sheet's complex behavior before about 125,000 years ago has been fragmentary at best.

Now, two first-of-their-kind studies provide new insight into the deep history of the Greenland Ice Sheet, looking back millions of years farther than previous techniques allowed. However, the two studies present some strongly contrasting evidence about how Greenland's ice sheet may have responded to past climate change -- bringing new urgency to the need to understand if and how the giant ice sheet might dramatically accelerate its melt-off in the near future.

The two new studies were published in the journal Nature, including one led by University of Vermont geologist Paul Bierman.

Ice On the East

In >the first study Bierman and four colleagues -- from UVM, Boston College, Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, and Imperial College London -- examined deep cores of ocean-bottom mud containing bits of bedrock that eroded off of the east side of Greenland. Their results show that East Greenland has been actively scoured by glacial ice for much of the last 7.5 million years -- and indicate that the ice sheet on this eastern flank of the island has not completely melted for long, if at all, in the past several million years. This result is consistent with existing computer models.

Their field-based data also suggest that during major climate cool-downs in the past several million years, the ice sheet expanded into previously ice-free areas, "showing that the ice sheet in East Greenland responds to and tracks global climate change," Bierman says. "The melting we are seeing today may be out of the bounds of how the Greenland ice sheet has behaved for many millions of years."

Since the data the team collected only came from samples off the east side of Greenland, their results don't provide a definitive picture of the whole Greenland ice sheet. But their research, with support from the National Science Foundation, provides strong evidence that "an ice sheet has been in East Greenland pretty much continuously for seven million years," says Jeremy Shakun, a geologist at Boston College who co-led the new study. "It's been bouncing around and dynamic -- but it's been there nearly all the time."

Contrasting Results

The >other study in Nature -- led by Joerg Schaefer of Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and Columbia University, and colleagues -- looked at a small sample of bedrock from one location beneath the middle of the existing ice sheet and came to what appears to be a different conclusion: Greenland was nearly ice-free for at least 280,000 years during the middle Pleistocene -- about 1.1 million years ago. This possibility is in contrast to existing computer models.

"These results appear to be contradictory -- but they may not be," UVM's Bierman says. He notes that both studies have "some blurriness," he says, in what they are able to resolve about short-term changes and the size of the ancient ice sheet. "Their study is a bit like one needle in a haystack," he says, "and ours is like having the whole haystack, but not being sure how big it is."

That's because Schaefer and colleagues' data comes from a single point in the middle of Greenland, pointing to a range of possible scenarios of what happened in the past, including several that challenge the image of Greenland being continuously covered by an extensive ice sheet during the Pleistocene. In contrast, Bierman and colleagues' data provides a record of continuous ice sheet activity over eastern Greenland but can't distinguish whether this was because there was a remnant in East Greenland or whether the ice sheet remained over the whole island, fluctuating in size as the climate warmed and cooled over millions of years.

"It's quite possible that both of these records are right for different places," Bierman says. "Both of these studies apply a similar innovative technique and let us look much farther into the past than we have been able to before."

New Method

Both teams of scientists used, "a powerful new tool for Earth scientists," says Dylan Rood, a scientist at Imperial College London and a co-author on the Bierman-led study: isotopes within grains of quartz, produced when bedrock is bombarded by cosmic rays from space. The isotopes come into being when rock is at or near Earth's surface -- but not when it's buried under an overlying ice sheet. By looking at the ratio of two of these cosmic-ray-made elements -- aluminum-26 and beryllium-10 caught in crystals of quartz, and measured in an accelerator mass spectrometer -- the scientists were able to calculate how long the rocks in their samples had been exposed to the sky versus covered by ice.

>Paul Bierman, a geologist at the University of Vermont and his colleagues --f rom UVM, Boston College, 
>Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, and Imperial College London--wanted to develop a better understanding 
>of the ancient history of the huge ice sheet that covers Greenland, like this portion of the ice sheet shown from 
>a helicopter on a Bierman-led expedition there. The team studied deep cores of ocean-bottom mud containing 
>bits of bedrock that eroded off of the east side of Greenland. Their results show that East Greenland has been 
>actively scoured by glacial ice for much of the last 7.5 million years--and indicate that the ice sheet on the 
>eastern flank of the island has not completely melted for long, if at all, in the past several million years. Their 
>field-based data also suggest that during major climate cool-downs in the past several million years, the ice sheet 
>expanded into previously ice-free areas, "showing that the ice sheet in East Greenland responds to and tracks
> global climate change," Bierman says. "The melting we are seeing today may be out of the bounds of how 
>the Greenland ice sheet has behaved for many millions of years." [Credit: Joshua Brown/UVM]
This isotope technique has been used for several decades for measuring land-based erosion, but this is its first application to ocean core samples, said Lee Corbett, a postdoctoral researcher at UVM and co-author with Bierman. "This has never been attempted with marine sediments," she says. Their results overcome a basic problem of trying to discern the deep history of ice from bedrock: every time an ice sheet retreats and then grows back, it scours away the bedrock and the isotope record of its own past. "It's hard to discern an ice sheet's cycles on land because it destroys the evidence," she says, "but it dumps that evidence in the oceans, archived in layers on the bottom."

Now Corbett, Shakun, and others are applying this isotope technique to additional cores taken from around the coast of Greenland to get a more complete and in-focus picture of the whole ice sheet's long history. And they have already applied the new isotope technique far beyond Greenland -- particularly in exploring the much larger, more mysterious ice sheets covering Antarctica.

"These two apparently conflicting -- but not necessarily conflicting -- studies in Nature really force the issue that we don't know enough about how ice sheets work over deep time," Bierman says. "We must recognize the importance of advancing polar science to understand how our world works. And, right now, because we're pumping huge plumes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, we really need to know how our world works."

The dynamics of Antarctica's giant ice sheet is full of questions and the disastrous potential. "But there's enough sea-level rise tied-up in Greenland alone to put a lot of cities and long stretches of coastline underwater," says Paul Bierman, "including Donald Trump's property in Florida."

Source: University of Vermont [December 07, 2016]

Human teeth discovered in southern China provide evidence that our species left the African continent up to 70,000 years earlier than prevailing theories suggest, a study published on Wednesday said.

Homo sapiens reached present-day China 80,000-120,000 years ago, according to the study, which could redraw the migration map for modern humans.

"The model that is generally accepted is that modern humans left Africa only 50,000 years ago," said Maria Martinon-Torres, a researcher at University College London and a co-author of the study.

"In this case, we are saying the H. sapiens is out of Africa much earlier," she told the peer-reviewed journal Nature, which published the study.

While the route they travelled remains unknown, previous research suggests the most likely path out of East Africa to east Asia was across the Arabian Peninsula and the Middle East.

The findings also mean that the first truly modern humans -- thought to have emerged in east Africa some 200,000 years ago -- landed in China well before they went to Europe.

There is no evidence to suggest that H. sapiens entered the European continent earlier than 45,000 years ago, at least 40,000 years after they showed up in present-day China.

The 47 teeth exhumed from a knee-deep layer of grey, sandy clay inside the Fuyan Cave near the town of Daoxian closely resemble the dental gear of "contemporary humans," according to the study.

They could only have come from a population that migrated from Africa, rather than one that evolved from an another species of early man such as the extinct Homo erectus, the authors said.

The scientists also unearthed the remains of some 38 mammals, including specimens of five extinct species, one of them a giant panda larger than those in existence today.

No tools were found.

"Judging by the cave environment, it may not have been a living place for humans," lead author Wu Liu from the Chinese Academy of Science in Beijing told AFP.

The study, published in the journal Nature, also rewrites the timeline of early man in China.

Up to now, the earliest proof of H. sapiens east of the Arabian Peninsula came from the Tianyuan Cave near Beijing, and dated from no more than 40,000 years ago.

The new discovery raises questions about why it took so long for H. sapiens to find their way to nearby Europe.

"Why is it that modern humans -- who were already at the gates -- didn't really get into Europe?", Martinon-Torres asked.

Wu and colleagues propose two explanations.

The first is the intimidating presence of Neanderthal man. While this species of early human eventually died out, they were spread across the European continent up until at least some 50,000 years ago.

"The classic idea is that H. sapiens... took over the Neanderthal empire, but maybe Neanderthals were a kind of ecological barrier, and Europe was too small a place" for both, Martinon-Torres said.

Another impediment might have been the cold.

Up until the Ice Age ended 12,000 years ago, ice sheets stretched across a good part of the European continent, a forbidding environment for a new species emerging from the relative warmth of East Africa.

"H. sapiens originated in or near the tropics, so it makes sense that the species' initial dispersal was eastwards rather than northwards, where winter temperatures rapidly fell below freezing," Robin Dennell of the University of Exeter said in a commentary, also in Nature.

Martinon-Torres laid out some of the questions to be addressed in future research, using both genetics and fossil records.

"What are the origins of these populations, and what was their fate? Did they vanish? Could they be the ancestors of later and current populations that entered Europe?"

She also suggested there might have been "different movements and migrations" out of Africa, not just one.

Besides the prehistoric panda, called Ailuropoda baconi, the scientists found an extinct species of a giant spotted hyaena.

An elephant-like creature called Stegodon orientalis and a giant tapir, also present, were species that may have survived into the era when the Chinese had developed writing, some 3500 years ago.

The cache of teeth nearly went unnoticed, Wu told AFP.

He and his Chinese colleagues discovered the cave -- and its menagerie of long-deceased animals -- in the 1980s, but had no inkling that it also contained human remains.

But 25 years later, while revisiting the site, Wu had a hunch.

"By thinking about the cave environment, we realised that human fossils might be found there," he told AFP by email. "So we started a five-year excavation."

Author: Marlowe Hood | Source: AFP [October 14, 2015]

Uplift associated with the Great Rift Valley of East Africa and the environmental changes it produced have puzzled scientists for decades because the timing and starting elevation have been poorly constrained.

Now paleontologists have tapped a fossil from the most precisely dated beaked whale in the world -- and the only stranded whale ever found so far inland on the African continent -- to pinpoint for the first time a date when East Africa's mysterious elevation began.

The 17 million-year-old fossil is from the beaked Ziphiidae whale family. It was discovered 740 kilometers inland at an elevation of 620 meters in modern Kenya's harsh desert region, said vertebrate paleontologist Louis L. Jacobs, Southern Methodist University, Dallas.

At the time the whale was alive, it would have been swimming far inland up a river with a low gradient ranging from 24 to 37 meters over more than 600 to 900 kilometers, said Jacobs, a co-author of the study.

The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, provides the first constraint on the start of uplift of East African terrain from near sea level.

"The whale was stranded up river at a time when east Africa was at sea level and was covered with forest and jungle," Jacobs said. "As that part of the continent rose up, that caused the climate to become drier and drier. So over millions of years, forest gave way to grasslands. Primates evolved to adapt to grasslands and dry country. And that's when -- in human evolution -- the primates started to walk upright."

Identified as a Turkana ziphiid, the whale would have lived in the open ocean, like its modern beaked cousins. Ziphiids, still one of the ocean's top predators, are the deepest diving air-breathing mammals alive, plunging to nearly 10,000 feet to feed, primarily on squid.

In contrast to most whale fossils, which have been discovered in marine rocks, Kenya's beached whale was found in river deposits, known as fluvial sediments, said Jacobs, a professor in the Roy M. Huffington Department of Earth Sciences of SMU's Dedman College of Humanities and Sciences. The ancient large Anza River flowed in a southeastward direction to the Indian Ocean. The whale, probably disoriented, swam into the river and could not change its course, continuing well inland.

"You don't usually find whales so far inland," Jacobs said. "Many of the known beaked whale fossils are dredged by fishermen from the bottom of the sea."

Determining ancient land elevation is very difficult, but the whale provides one near sea level.

"It's rare to get a paleo-elevation," Jacobs said, noting only one other in East Africa, determined from a lava flow.

Beaked whale fossil surfaced after going missing for more than 30 years

The beaked whale fossil was discovered in 1964 by J.G. Mead in what is now the Turkana region of northwest Kenya.

Mead, an undergraduate student at Yale University at the time, made a career at the Smithsonian Institution, from which he recently retired. Over the years, the Kenya whale fossil went missing in storage. Jacobs, who was at one time head of the Division of Paleontology for the National Museums of Kenya, spent 30 years trying to locate the fossil. His effort paid off in 2011, when he rediscovered it at Harvard University and returned it to the National Museums of Kenya.

The fossil is only a small portion of the whale, which Mead originally estimated was 7 meters long during its life. Mead unearthed the beak portion of the skull, 2.6 feet long and 1.8 feet wide, specifically the maxillae and premaxillae, the bones that form the upper jaw and palate.

The researchers reported their findings in "A 17 million-year-old whale constrains onset of uplift and climate change in East Africa" online at the PNAS web site.

Modern cases of stranded whales have been recorded in the Thames River in London, swimming up a gradient of 2 meters over 70 kilometers; the Columbia River in Washington state, a gradient of 6 meters over 161 kilometers; the Sacramento River in California, a gradient of 4 meters over 133 kilometers; and the Amazon River in Brazil, a gradient of 1 meter over 1,000 kilometers.

Source: Southern Methodist University [March 17, 2015]

Archaeologists from the British museum have reconstructed an ancient man's face, allowing visitors to see what he looked like for the first time.

The man lived 9,500 years ago in the holy city of Jericho, now found in the Palestinian territories near the West Bank.

The 'Jericho skull' was found by British archaeologists in 1953, but until now nobody knew what the he had looked like.

Scientists still don't know the man's true identity, but they speculate that he was once someone of great importance.

This is based on the amount of care people had taken to fill his skull with plaster once he had died, almost 10,000 years ago.

Back then, plastered skulls were a form of ritual burial, like the Egyptians' infamous mummification burials.

The gruesome practice involved removing the corpse's skull and filling it with plaster, before painting over the dead person's face and filling his eye sockets with shells.

These remains were likely put on display for locals while the rest of the body was buried under the family home.

The Jericho skull was found nestled alongside several other plastered skulls, but was by far the most well-preserved of the group.

'He was certainly a mature individual when he died, but we cannot say exactly why his skull, or for that matter the other skulls that were buried alongside him, were chosen to be plastered,' British Museum curator Alexandra Fletcher told >Seeker.

'It may have been something these individuals achieved in life that led to them being remembered after death.'

Before the reconstruction, the ancient skull showed few human features due to the plaster pasting over most of its features.

To investigate the grim burial practice, the scientists sent the skull off for a scan at the Imaging and Analysis Centre at London's Natural History Museum.

Here, a complete micro-CT scan unveiled a ream of new information about the skull, and inspired the Museum to undertake a full plaster reconstruction.

Through the CT scans, the team discovered that the ancient man was missing a jaw underneath the plaster, and had lines of decaying teeth.

They could see he had suffered a broken nose at some point in his life.

He had also undergone head-binding, a traditional practice in which the skull of a human being is deformed intentionally, usually by forcefully distorting a child's skull.

'Head binding is something that many different peoples have undertaken in various forms around the world until very recently,' Fletcher told Seeker.

'In this case, the bindings have made the top and back of the head broader - different from other practices that aim for an elongated shape. I think this was regarded as a 'good look' in Jericho at this time.'

All of the newly gathered details allowed the team to make an accurate plaster reconstruction of the man's head.

And while the fascinating new model provides fresh insight into the man's life, plenty more work needs to be done to discover more about his history and culture.

The team hopes to gather DNA samples from the skull in future, laying out 10,000 year-old genes for investigation.

But the process would be risky - it's likely to damage the skull and useful results aren't guaranteed.

'If we were able to extract DNA from the human remains beneath the plaster, there is currently a very slight chance that we would be able to find out this individual's hair and eye colour,' Fletcher said.

'I say a slight chance because the DNA preservation in such ancient human remains can be too poor to obtain any information.'

The reconstructed face will be on display at the British Museum in London from next Thursday until mid-February.

Author: Harry Pettit | Source: Daily Mail Online [December 09, 2016]

3D reconstructions of some of Syria's most spectacular archaeological sites go online Tuesday after a big push to digitalise the war-torn country's threatened heritage.

French digital surveyors have been working with Syrian archaeologists to map some of the country's most famous monuments after Islamic State jihadists sparked international outrage by blowing up two temples in the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Palmyra last year.

The eighth-century Umayyad Mosque in the capital Damascus—regarded by some as the fourth holiest place in Islam—and the Krak des Chevaliers Crusader castle near the ravaged city of Homs are the two most famous buildings to have been scanned in minute detail.

Photogrammetric technology developed by the French start-up Iconem has also been used to record the Roman theatre in the coastal city of Jableh and the Phoenician site in the ancient port of Ugarit, where evidence of the world's oldest alphabet was found.

Its technicians have also been working alongside 15 specialists from the Syrian Directorate General of Antiquities and Museums (DGAM) to digitalise some of the country's major museum collections.

Hundreds of important heritage sites have been sacked or destroyed during the five-year conflict, with the destruction of the first-century temples of Bel and Baalshamin in the ancient desert city of Palmyra causing a global outcry.

The Islamic State group has made a point of razing ancient shrines and statues it considers as idolatry and is also suspected of involvement in the illegal sale of antiquities.

Work on the "Syrian Heritage" database, the biggest 3D record of the country's monuments and treasures, began in December and includes a large number of Ottoman-era buildings in Damascus as well as its 11th-century citadel, which looms over the city.

The head of DGAM, Maamoun Abdulkarim, said the operation was essential to "avoid an irreplacable loss to humanity" given "the dramatic situation in our country".

"This solution gives our archaeological sites a real hope of renaissance and allows the memory of them to be preserved, no matter what happens," he added in a statement.

The drive, carried out with the help of the French grande ecole ENS and the research institute INRIA, is one of a number trying to catalogue sites in danger of falling into the line of fire.

The Institute for Digital Archaeology, created by Oxford and Harvard universities and Dubai's Museum of the Future, is also compiling a record of many vulnerable sites in Syria and neighbouring Iraq.

It has handed out 5,000 low-cost 3D cameras to archaeologists and NGOs with the hope of gathering a million images of threatened sites.

The Million Images Database hopes be fully online by the end of the year and will display life-size replicas of Palmyra's destroyed triumphal arch in New York's Times Square and London's Trafalgar Square in April.

The replicas of the arch, blown up by IS jihadists in October, are being made with the world's largest 3D printer.

France's culture minister had earlier floated the idea of a 3D recreation of the ancient city, known as the "Pearl of the Desert", based on photos taken by tourists over the years.

Author: Laurence Benhamou | Source: AFP [March 14, 2016]

As armed groups in Syria and Iraq destroy priceless archaeological sites, European authorities and dealers are on high alert for smaller, looted artefacts put on sale to help finance the jihadists' war.

Stolen-art expert Chris Marinello, director of Art Recovery International, said he has been shown photographs of items being offered from Syria that were "clearly looted right out of the ground".

"You could still see dirt on some of these objects," he told AFP.

They included cylinder seals, Roman bottles and vases, although Marinello said it was unclear whether the items were still in Syria, were in transit or had arrived in the key markets of Europe and the United States.

Concerns about looting during the Syrian war have increased following the advance of the Islamic State group through parts of Syria and Iraq, and recent propaganda videos showing their destruction of ancient sites such as Nimrud.

The UN Security Council in February demanded UN states act to stop the trade in cultural property from those two countries, amid warnings that they represented a significant source of funding for the militant group.

Experts say it is impossible to put a value on antiquities looted from Syria, which has been home to many civilisations through the millennia, from the Canaanites to the Ottomans.

The London-based International Association of Dealers in Ancient Art (IADAA) estimates the entire legitimate antiquities market in 2013 was worth between 150 and 200 million euros ($160-215 million).

Marinello said reputable dealers are "being very careful not to touch anything that could remotely be part of this recent wave of looting".

But Hermann Parzinger, an archaeologist and president of the Germany-based Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, said there was an "enormous market" from private buyers.

He warned that the cultural costs were huge, telling AFP: "The context which is so important to reconstruct the history of these civilisations is completely destroyed."    

Italy has proposed that world heritage body UNESCO create a military taskforce to protect cultural sites in war zones, but many experts believe little can be done to stop the current destruction.

Instead, they are forced to wait until the conflict ends and watch in horror as priceless historic sites are destroyed and the spoils gradually emerge onto the market.

Vernon Rapley, a former head of the art and antiquities squad at London's Metropolitan Police, expects many Syrian items to be held back to avoid flooding the market, as occurred after the US-led invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan.

The looted artefacts were likely to be "hauled up in warehouses either in the country or near the country, and only linked to the art trade in small pieces and at a later stage", he told AFP.

Stephane Thefo, who leads an Interpol unit dedicated to fighting the illegal trafficking of cultural goods, agreed that many items may disappear for years -- but insisted that tackling the trade was the best way to combat looting.

The French policeman would like to see tougher national laws on trafficking of cultural goods, something Germany is currently considering.

"We have to act by seeking to narrow markets for the illicit trade, hoping that by curbing the demand, the supply would eventually decrease," Thefo said.

Identifying looted objects is no easy task, however, not least because cultural crime is rarely a police priority.

The law puts the onus on the authorities to prove an item is illegal and a long delay in an artefact being sold, or multiple owners, make it hard to establish provenance.

At a conference at the V&A museum in London this week on the destruction of cultural property in conflict areas in Iraq and Syria, Mali, Libya and Yemen, archaeologists stressed the need for proper inventories of heritage sites.

They noted that objects that have been photographed and digitally catalogued are more likely to be recovered.

Interpol is currently building a database of stolen objects, and James Ede, a London dealer and IADAA board member, urged cultural bodies to share their information with dealers.

"This material will necessarily surface on the open market sooner or later. The challenge therefore is to identify it and where possible to return it when it is safe to do so," he said.

Author: Alice Ritchie | Source: AFP [April 17, 2015]

The United Nations agency UNESCO will use more monitoring by satellites to protect threatened ancient archeological sites, it announced.

UNESCO and UNITAR-UNOSAT (United Nations Institute for Training and Research- United Nations Operational Satellite Applications Program) signed an agreement to better protect the world's cultural and natural heritage sites by using geospatial photographic capabilities, UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova said Wednesday at a conference in London. The agreement comes as ancient sites in the Middle East are under assault by terrorist organizations which include the Islamic State (IS).

IS overtook the 2,000 year-old archaeological site at Palmyra, Syria, a city of Greek and Roman ruins, in May and has threatened to destroy it. Bokova said IS has destroyed mausoleums, temples and statues around the area on a wide scale, and planted explosives within the ancient city. It previously destroyed Assyrian ruins and artifacts in Syria.

Monitoring by satellite could reduce and document the extent of destruction, prepare reconstruction and provide evidence for international courts of justice, she added.

"We are very worried about Libya, being a divided country. We have a small office there and are working with the local governments and mayors. We are very concerned about the expansion of Isis (IS) and youth radicalization. We are worried about Somalia. This (the satellite program) is our response to extremism," Bokova said.

The agreement was signed Wednesday in Bonn, Germany.

Author: Ed Adamczyk | Source: UPI [July 02, 2015]

One of the most exciting projects in recent years at Maidstone Museum – the scanning and facial reconstruction of its very own 2,700-year-old mummy – is well underway thanks to the support of the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF). The project, within the redevelopment of the museum’s Ancient Civilisations gallery, has seen the mummy travel across Maidstone to KIMS Hospital to undergo a full body scan and closer inspection by the local team of radiologists. The scan has revealed a number of fascinating finds about the mummy as well as other mummified remains in the museum’s collection – all before the full investigation into results has really begun with a team of international specialists.

“We weren’t expecting too much to be derived from the initial scans of Ta-Kush and the other items, but the results seen have been remarkable,” said Samantha Harris, Collections Manager at Maidstone Museum. “It was such a pleasure to work alongside the Imaging Team at KIMS Hospital in being able to analyse these items and, for the initial results to reveal so much means, the remainder of the Ancient Civilisations gallery project has been injected with a whole new level of excitement.”

Among the initial findings, the scans revealed that, while many believed Ta-Kush to have passed away during adolescence, she may in fact have been much older. Speaking of the findings, Mark Garrad, CT Lead Radiographer at KIMS Hospital, said: “The scans conducted indicate evidence of well-worn teeth, loss of enamel, cavities, abscesses in the jaw and fully erupted wisdom teeth. Although we cannot place her age exactly, the evidence we have managed to glean from the initial scans would suggest a person who is at least mid-twenties, possibly much older. It has been fascinating to be part of the early stages of discovery and we are looking forward to what other insights the experts can gather about Ta-Kush.”

The scans also show further evidence of a wedge fracture in one of her vertebrae, which is seen in patients suffering a downward impact, such as a fall or landing upright. Images show that there may be signs of healing, however, it indicates that Ta-Kush could well have been living with this injury.

Further research into the life and conservation of Ta-Kush is set to be conducted over the course of the next few months with Liverpool John Moores University analysing the scans and creating a facial reconstruction. Thanks to the HLF funding, and with support from the Maidstone Museums’ Foundation, the Egyptology Department at the British Museum, the Petrie Museum at University College London, Western Ontario University and the Egypt Exploration Society, this research will uncover the stories behind the scanned human and animal remains ready for the redisplay of the wider Ancient Egyptian and Greek World collections, to be unveiled in summer 2017.

Source: Maidstone Museum [November 15, 2016]

The transition from hunter-gatherer to sedentary farming 10,000 years ago occurred in multiple neighbouring but genetically distinct populations according to research by an international team including UCL.

“It had been widely assumed that these first farmers were from a single, genetically homogeneous population. However, we’ve found that there were deep genetic differences in these early farming populations, indicating very distinct ancestries,” said corresponding author Dr Garrett Hellenthal, UCL Genetics.

The study, published today in >Science and funded by Wellcome and Royal Society, examined ancient DNA from some of the world’s first farmers from the Zagros region of Iran and found it to be very different from the genomes of early farmers from the Aegean and Europe. The team identified similarities between the Neolithic farmer’s DNA and that of living people from southern Asia, including from Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, and Iranian Zoroastrians in particular.

“We know that farming technologies, including various domestic plants and animals, arose across the Fertile Crescent, with no particular centre” added co-author Professor Mark Thomas, UCL Genetics, Evolution & Environment.

“But to find that this region was made up of highly genetically distinct farming populations was something of a surprise. We estimated that they separated some 46 to 77,000 years ago, so they would almost certainly have looked different, and spoken different languages. It seems like we should be talking of a federal origin of farming.”

The switch from mobile hunting and gathering to sedentary farming first occurred around 10,000 years ago in south-western Asia and was one of the most important behavioural transitions since humans first evolved in Africa some 200,000 years ago. It led to profound changes in society, including greater population densities, new diseases, poorer health, social inequality, urban living, and ultimately, the rise of ancient civilizations.

Animals and plants were first domesticated across a region stretching north from modern-day Israel, Palestine and Lebanon to Syria and eastern Turkey, then east into, northern Iraq and north-western Iran, and south into Mesopotamia; a region known as the Fertile Crescent.

“Such was the impact of farming on our species that archaeologists have debated for more than 100 years how it originated and how it was spread into neighbouring regions such as Europe, North Africa and southern Asia,” said co-author Professor Stephen Shennan, UCL Institute of Archaeology.

“We’ve shown for the first time that different populations in different parts of the Fertile Crescent were coming up with similar solutions to finding a successful way of life in the new conditions created by the end of the last Ice Age.”

By looking at how ancient and living people share long sections of DNA, the team showed that early farming populations were highly genetically structured, and that some of that structure was preserved as farming, and farmers, spread into neighbouring regions; Europe to the west and southern Asia to the east.

“Early farmers from across Europe, and to some extent modern-day Europeans, can trace their DNA to early farmers living in the Aegean, whereas people living in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran and India share considerably more long chunks of DNA with early farmers in Iran. This genetic legacy of early farmers persists, although of course our genetic make-up subsequently has been reshaped by many millennia of other population movements and intermixing of various groups,” concluded Dr Hellenthal.

Source: University College London [July 14, 2016]

The stories of Roman lives are written their bones: diet, disease, childbirth and trauma all leave their mark. Individual skeletons can tell rich tales, but the fullest information comes from large groups, when we can look at populations. So what can we learn about about a Roman community from their skeletons?

Whether they were a slave

Slavery was ubiquitous in the Roman world, and some of its agonies are preserved on skeletons: those working in and living near Roman mines in Jordan were exposed to lead and copper at levels that would have been toxic, and caused a range of illnesses. The remains of people who were likely to have been slaves have also been found still wearing iron shackles, for instance in a subterranean room of a villa in Pompeii, and near the silver mines of Laurion in Roman-era Greece.

Whether they played sports

Among the human remains from ancient Herculaneum, which was destroyed by the eruption of Vesuvius at the same time as Pompeii, were a possible boxer, with typical fractures to his hands and nose, and a javelin-thrower whose bones reveal the same elbow problems experienced by modern athletes.

How they died, who they loved

At Dura-Europos in Syria, remains of Roman and Sasanian troops trapped in a siege mine beneath the walls of the ancient city reveal the brutal and violent reality of ancient conflict, including gas warfare. In the nearby cemetery, families were buried together in underground tombs, with women and children placed together.

Where people came from

Even places like Roman Britain were diverse. Scientific methods (such as isotope analysis), as well as the study of graves and grave goods (the objects buried with a body) can tell us where a person was likely to have come from, or where they had links to. For instance, work on the cemeteries of Roman York has shown that people buried there came from other places in Britain, and much further afield in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa.

The extent of childhood illnesses

In the Roman world, children often didn’t make it to adulthood. Roman cemeteries such as Poundbury in Dorset include many children with rickets, scurvy and anaemia – survival rates were staggeringly low by modern Western standards. Infant and early childhood mortality was high in the Roman period, with 45% of children unlikely to survive past five years of age.

So we can learn a lot about how a Roman may have lived from her or his remains, but, while skeletons are biological, bodies are cultured and contextual; they can be modified to fit ideals of beauty, status, or gender. Ultimately, Roman skeletons tell us that culture is a significant factor in determining difference: underneath it all, we’re pretty much the same collection of 206 interlocking parts.

Dr Jen Baird and Dr Tim Reynolds from the Department of History, Classics and Archaeology, Birkbeck College, University of London, will be talking in depth about Roman skeletons at a Guardian Live/Birkbeck event on 21 November.

Authors: Dr Jen Baird and Dr Tim Reynolds | Source: The Guardian [November 14, 2015]

The Islamic State released photos showing the destruction of six priceless artifacts from the ancient city of Palmyra. The photos show jihadis taking a sledgehammer and smashing the historic treasures, including one dating from the second century.

Jihadis took sledgehammers to the relics, smashed them to pieces and then lashed the man who allegedly smuggled the artifacts in a public square full of onlookers, they announced on social media Thursday.

One-fifth of Iraq's approximately 10,000 world-renowned cultural heritage sites are under the Islamic State's control and most have been heavily looted, Irina Bokova, the head of the U.N. cultural agency UNESCO, warned experts in London Thursday. Some Syrian sites have been so badly ransacked that experts say they no longer have historical or archaeological value.

"Violent extremists don't destroy [heritage] as a collateral damage, they target systematically monuments and sites to strike societies at their core," Bokova said Wednesday.

The 2,000-year-old Allat God statue, which depicts a lion catching a deer between its feet, is believed to have been destroyed Saturday. "ISIS terrorists have destroyed one of the most important unearthed statues in Syria in terms of quality and weight...it was discovered in 1977 and dates back to the second century A.D.," Ma'moun Abdul-Karim, director of museums and antiquities, told Syrian state-run news agency SANA Thursday.

It's "the most serious crime they have committed against Palmyra's heritage," he added to the AFP.

The militants have also planted improvised explosive devices (IEDs) around the ruins of the ancient city. The explosives appear placed according to a pattern that indicates they are set to optimize the "filmed destruction," says Michael Danti, co-director of the Syrian Heritage Initiative at the American Schools of Oriental Research, a group monitoring cultural damage in Syria and Iraq.

"The deliberate destruction, what we are seeing today in Iraq and Syria, has reached unprecedented levels in contemporary history," said Bokova.

Author: Barbara Boland | Source: Washington Examiner [July 02, 2015]

A DNA analysis of four ancient Roman skeletons found in London shows the first inhabitants of the city were a multi-ethnic mix similar to contemporary Londoners, the Museum of London said on Monday.

Two of the skeletons were of people born outside Britain -- one of a man linked genealogically to eastern Europe and the Near East, the other of a teenage girl with blue eyes from north Africa.

The injuries to the man's skull suggest that he may have been killed in the city's amphitheatre before his head was dumped into an open pit.

Both the man and the girl were suffering from periodontal disease, a type of gum disease.

The other two skeletons of people believed to have been born in Britain were of a woman with maternal ancestry from northern Europe and of a man also with links through his mother to Europe or north Africa.

"We have always understood that Roman London was a culturally diverse place and now science is giving us certainty," said Caroline McDonald, senior curator of Roman London at the museum.

"People born in Londinium lived alongside people from across the Roman Empire exchanging ideas and cultures, much like the London we know today," she said.

The museum said in a statement that this was "the first multidisciplinary study of the inhabitants of a city anywhere in the Roman Empire".

The Romans founded Britain's capital city in the middle of the first century AD, under the emperor Claudius.

Britain's University of Durham researched stable isotopes from tooth enamel to determine migration patterns.

A tooth from each skeleton was also sent to McMaster University in Canada for DNA analysis that established the hair and eye colour of each individual and identified the diseases they were suffering from.

McMaster University also examined the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) to identify maternal ancestry.

The exhibition of the four skeletons, entitled "Written in Bone", opens on Friday.

Source: AFP [November 24, 2015]

A large wooden model boat from the Egyptian Middle Period 2123-1797 BC, sold for £161,000 at Bonhams Antiquities Sale in London yesterday. The boat had been estimated at £30,000-50,000.

Boats were an integral part of Egyptian everyday life and mythology and as such they were considered necessary in the afterlife. Usually two model boats were provided for each tomb, one showing the crew sailing south with the prevailing wind and the other with the crew rowing north.

The boat was originally bought by British army officer, Esmond Sinauer, in Egypt in the early part of the 20th century and passed by descent to the Scottish private collection from which it was consigned for sale.

In total the sale made more than £1,310,000.

Other highlights included:

• A late Egyptian Bronze Cat from around 664-30 BC estimated at £20,000-30,000 which sold for £137,000. The cat had been in the well-known collection of the Antiquities dealer Raymond Richardson who acquired it in the 1950s.

• A Roman Marble Mask of a Woman from the 1st century AD which sold for £102,500 having been estimated at £20,000-30,000.

• A Roman Marble torso of a man estimated at £30,000-50,000 which sold for £60,000.

Bonhams Senior Specialist in Antiquities, Siobhan Quin, said,” The wooden boat was an exceptionally fine work of particularly impressive dimensions which attracted a lot pre-sale interest, reflected in keen bidding in the sale room on the phones and on the internet. In a strong sale, a first-century bronze Egyptian cat also stood out, but many other pieces also exceeded their estimates.”

Source: Bonhams [December 01, 2016]

The Antiquities Ministry announced Sunday it received an ancient Egyptian wall relief that was repatriated in October by Egypt’s embassy in London.

The painted limestone wall relief was delivered to the Egyptian embassy in London after its owner, who bought it from a British antiquities collector, learnt it had been  stolen and smuggled out of Egypt, Antiquities Minister Mamdouh al Damaty said in a statement Sunday.

The artifact dates back to the reign of the 19th Dynasty Pharaoh Seti I (1290 B.C. – 1279 B.C.) Damaty said, adding that it will be displayed at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.

It measure approximately 43cm (17.2 inches) by 67 cm with carvings representing Pharaoh Seti I making offerings before Anubis, the mummification God and Hathor, ancient Egyptian motherhood Goddess, he added.

Originally located in an ancient Egyptian temple in Upper Egypt’s governorate of Asyut, the limestone relief was smuggled out of Egypt in 1970, the foreign ministry said in a statement last week.

Egypt’s political turmoil has led to a security lapse at archaeological sites and storerooms and museums nationwide, leaving Egypt’s treasures vulnerable to looting. The Egyptian museum and Malawi museum are among the sites that have been affected.

During the past four years, Egypt has recovered over 1,600 artifacts and is currently working on other cases in many European countries, Ministry of Antiquities Museums Sector head Ahmed Sharaf previously told The Cairo Post.

“It is impossible to provide an accurate number of the artifacts that have been stolen since the January 25 Revolution,” he said.

Author: Rany Mostafa | Source: The Cairo Post [December 13, 2015]

An application has been lodged with the Culture and Tourism Ministry to conduct a surface survey to investigate the ancient city of Satala, which served as a military headquarters in the Roman Empire in the northern Turkish province of Gümüşhane’s Kelkit district.

According to historical records, the city, which is 28 kilometers from the city center, was established by the 15th Apollo Legion, a legion of the Imperial Roman army. It served as a headquarters in the ancient era and also served as an intersection of military roads passing through Anatolia and Cappadocia.

The city was controlled at various times by the Assyrian, Graeco-Macedonian, Roman and Byzantine civilizations.

A 47-arched aqueduct was built to bring water to the ancient city of Satala but only one arch survives today.

The city is believed to cover a very large area. Candles, rings, arms, pots, metal pieces and coins have all been discovered at the site and are now on display at the Istanbul Archaeology Museum, while a bronze bust of Aphrodite is at London’s British Museum.

Kelkit Mayor Ünal Yılmaz said the ancient city of Satala, which is under protection as an archaeological site, had been examined by university academics.

As a result of the examination, a report was prepared by the Gümüşhane Governor’s Office, Kelkit Municipality and academics. In line with the report, an application was made to the Culture and Tourism Ministry to conduct a surface survey.

Yılmaz said no serious work had been carried out in the historical city.

“No work has been implemented here although there were discussions from time to time. Evaluations were also made but nothing was done in practice. Because it is an archaeological site, people were not able to build structures there. I hope the applications will receive a positive response and that works will be initiated,” Yılmaz said.

“Our academics are very hopeful on the issue. We think this area will add a lot to tourism for our province and district after the pre-excavation work is completed,” Yılmaz said.

Source: Hurriyet Daily News [March 15, 2016]

A miniature ancient Egyptian coffin measuring just 44cm in length has been found to contain the youngest ever example of a human foetus to be embalmed and buried in Egyptian society. This discovery is the only academically verified specimen to exist at only sixteen to eighteen weeks of gestation.

This landmark discovery from the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, is remarkable evidence of the importance that was placed on official burial rituals in ancient Egypt, even for those lives that were lost so early on in their existence. Curators at the Fitzwilliam made the discovery, during their research for the pioneering bicentennial exhibition Death on the Nile: Uncovering the afterlife of ancient Egypt.

The tiny coffin was excavated at Giza in 1907 by the British School of Archaeology and came into the collection at the Fitzwilliam Museum the same year. It is a perfect miniature example of a wooden coffin of the ancient Egyptian ‘Late Period’ and may date to around 664-525 BC. The lid and box are both made from cedar wood. Although the coffin is deteriorated, it is clear that the wood was carefully carved on a painstakingly small scale and decorated. This gave the curators at the Fitzwilliam the first very clear indication of the importance given to the coffin’s contents at this time in ancient Egyptian society.

The diminutive wrapped package inside was carefully bound in bandages, over which molten black resin had been poured before the coffin was closed. For many years it was thought that the contents were the mummified remains of internal organs that were routinely removed during the embalming of bodies.

Examination using X-ray imaging at the Fitzwilliam Museum was inconclusive, but suggested that it may contain a small skeleton. It was therefore decided to micro CT (computed tomography) scan the tiny bundle at Cambridge University’s Department of Zoology. The cross-sectional images this produced gave the first pictures of the remains of a tiny human body held within the wrappings, which remain undisturbed.

Dr Tom Turmezei, recently Honorary Consultant Radiologist at Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge collaborated with the Fitzwilliam Museum, alongside Dr. Owen Arthurs, Academic Consultant Paediatric Radiologist at Great Ormond Street Hospital, London. The ground-breaking results were based on their extensive knowledge of CT imaging and paediatric autopsy.

Five digits on both hands and feet and the long bones of the legs and arms were all clearly visible. Although the soft skull and pelvis were found to be collapsed the categorical consensus was that inside the bundle was a human foetus estimated to be of no more than eighteen weeks gestation. It was impossible to give a gender to the specimen and it is thought that the foetus was probably the result of a miscarriage, as there were no obvious abnormalities to explain why it could not have been carried to full-term.

From the micro CT scan it is noticeable that the foetus has its arms crossed over its chest. This, coupled with the intricacy of the tiny coffin and its decoration, are clear indications of the importance and time given to this burial in Egyptian society.

"CT imaging has been used successfully by the museum for several projects in recent years, but this is our most successful find so far," Dr. Tom Turmezei explained. "The ability of CT to show the inner workings of such artefacts without causing any structural damage proved even more invaluable in this case, allowing us to review the foetus for abnormalities and attempt to age it as accurately as possible."

Julie Dawson, Head of Conservation at the Fitzwilliam Museum said, "Using non-invasive modern technology to investigate this extraordinary archaeological find has provided us with striking evidence of how an unborn child might be viewed in ancient Egyptian society. The care taken in the preparation of this burial clearly demonstrates the value placed on life even in the first weeks of its inception."

Tutankhamun’s tomb contained two small foetuses that had been mummified and placed in individual coffins, but these infants were both significantly more developed, at about 25 weeks and 37 weeks into gestation. Very few other examples of burials of miscarried babies have so far been identified from ancient Egypt.

The miniature coffin is currently on display as part of the exhibition >Death on the Nile: Uncovering the Afterlife of ancient Egypt until 22nd May 2016 at the Fitzwilliam Museum Cambridge.

Source: University of Cambridge [May 12, 2016]

The destruction at the ancient city of Palmyra symbolises the suffering of the Syrian people at the hands of the terrorist group known as Islamic State (IS). Palmyra was a largely Roman city located at a desert oasis on a vital crossroad, and “one of the most important cultural centres of the ancient world”. Its remarkable preservation highlighted an intermingling of cultures that today, as then, came to stand for the tolerance and multiculturalism that pre-conflict Syria was renowned for -– tolerance that IS seeks to eradicate.

Early in the conflict, the area was heavily fortified. Roads and embankments were dug through the necropolises and the Roman walls, and the historic citadel defences were upgraded. Yet the terrorists occupied and desecrated the city from May 2015, systematically destroying monuments such as the Temple of Baalshamin, the Temple of Bel, seven tower tombs, a large Lion goddess statue and two Islamic shrines. They ransacked the museum, tortured and executing the former site director Khaled al-Asaad in search of treasure to sell. According to satellite imagery analysis the site was heavily looted throughout it all.

Now the city has been recaptured, the first damage assessments are underway, and Syrian – and international – attention is already turning to restoration. This work will be greatly aided by the Syrians who risked their lives to transport the contents of the Palmyra museum to safety. The last truck pulled out as IS arrived, with bullets whizzing past.

Even as they were displaced, Syrians have worked to keep a detailed memory of the city alive. Syrian artists created artworks depicting the destruction. In a Jordanian camp, refugees made miniature models of the city and other cultural sites, even measuring out the number and position of Palmyra’s columns from photographs.

The international community is also playing its part. Groups like UNOSAT, the UN’s satellite imagery analysts have used satellite imagery to monitor the damage. On the ground, Syrian-founded NGOs like APSA have linked with universities to assess the site. Groups such as NewPalmyra and Palmyra 3D Model are using the latest technology to create open-access 3D computer models from photographs.

Others have gone even further. The Million Image Database Project at the Oxford Institute for Digital Archaeology distributed cameras to volunteers across the Middle East to collect 3D photos of sites. As well as creating 3D models, they will recreate full-scale artefacts, sites, and architectural features using their own cement-based 3D printing techniques. This will start with a recreation of the arch from Palmyra’s Temple of Bel, due to be unveiled in London in April 2016.

Ethics of restoration

As well as being used for research, education and enjoyment, this technology could recreate (and perhaps ultimately restore) what IS has destroyed. 3D printing can be done in any colour of shapeable material, and can be as obvious – or as unobtrusive – as desired. The group is also exploring using computer-guided tools to quickly carve their models into stone.

It wouldn’t be the first time such large-scale restoration has been undertaken. Historic central Warsaw, for example, was destroyed during World War II, and was almost completely reconstructed and is now a World Heritage site. Reconstruction is costly, but might be accomplished more quickly and cheaply using new digital techniques, showing the world that Syria values its cultural heritage.

But many argue that 3D printing fails to capture the authenticity of the original structures, amounting to little more than the Disneyfication of heritage. They also point out that the fighting is still ongoing: 370,000 Syrians are dead, millions are displaced, and perhaps 50%-70% of the nearby town has been destroyed. Given the pressing humanitarian needs, stabilisation alone should be the priority for now.

Rebuilding also fails to redress the loss caused by the extensive looting of the site, focusing only on the dramatically destroyed monuments. Perhaps most importantly, its worth asking whether returning Palmyra exactly to its pre-conflict state denies a major chapter of its history? There needs to be a wide-ranging discussion on the priorities for the immediate future and the nature of any future reconstruction.

As has happened after previous conflicts, there may need to be a memorial as a testimony to those beheaded in the arena, or tied to columns that were detonated, or to the former site director executed in trying to protect this site that was so important to him. These stories, and many more, are a part of Palmyra’s, and Syria’s, history.

One thing is clear: while Palmyra may hold great significance to the world, the final decision should belong to those who have lived alongside it, cared for it, managed it, fought for it, and protected it for generations: the Syrian people.

Author: Emma Cunliffe, University Of Oxford | Source: The Conversation [March 31, 2016]

This spring the British Museum will stage a major exhibition on the human body in ancient Greek art, sponsored by Julius Baer.

This exhibition will explore the Greek experience and its preoccupation with the human form. To the ancient Greeks the body was a thing of beauty and a bearer of meaning. The remarkable works of art in the exhibition range from the abstract simplicity of prehistoric figurines to breathtaking realism in the age of Alexander the Great. Giving form to thought, these works continued to inspire artists for hundreds of years and, over time, shaped the way we think of ourselves.

The exhibition will feature around 150 objects, including some of the most beautiful Greek sculpture to have survived from antiquity. In addition to iconic white marble statues, the exhibition will include exquisite works in terracotta, beautiful bronzes and fascinating vases that demonstrate the quality and inventiveness of ancient Greek craftsmen. Outstanding objects from the British Museum, one of the most important collections of Greek art in the world, will be shown alongside extraordinary loans from other world-class collections.

Ancient Greek sculpture was both art and experience. The exhibition will present sculpture as an encounter between viewer and the object. The first such encounter will be a newly discovered original bronze sculpture of a nude athlete, scraping his body with a metal tool after exercise and before bathing. Raised off the seabed near Lošinj, Croatia in 1999, this rare survival of an ancient bronze statue will be shown for the first time in Britain after years of conservation.

For the first time, six Parthenon sculptures will be taken out of the permanent Parthenon gallery and will be installed in the temporary exhibition in order to contribute to a different narrative from their usual context. As a supreme example of the work of the sculptor Phidias, the river god Ilissos will be shown in dialogue with the work of two of the sculptor’s contemporaries; the Townley Discobolus, a Roman copy of the lost original by Myron, and Georg Römer’s reconstruction of the Doryphoros by Polykleitos. The three great sculptors of the age, Myron, Polykleitos and Phidias, were said to have been trained in the workshop of a single master and each motivated by a strong impulse to outdo the other. In addition to the figure of Ilissos, other examples of sculpture from the Parthenon temple will be shown in different sections of the exhibition including a metope, two blocks from the frieze, one figure from the West Pediment and one figure from the East Pediment group.

The exhibition will also explore the revival of the Greek body in the modern era following its destruction and disappearance at the end of pagan antiquity. Prior to the arrival of the Parthenon sculptures in London in the early 1800s, Greek art was viewed through Roman copies of lost Greek originals, such as the Belvedere Torso, which will be lent by the Vatican Museum. This seated hero, perhaps Herakles, was regarded by Michelangelo as the finest fragment of classical sculpture that could be seen in his day. It will be shown alongside his drawing of Adam for the Sistine Chapel ceiling. These masterpieces will be displayed in a unique combination with a reclining nude figure from the East pediment of the Parthenon. Thus the school of Michelangelo will be brought together with the school of Phidias for the first time.

The exhibition will explore how, in Greek art, the body acts as a pictorial language for articulating the human condition. It can represent every aspect of mortal and divine experience, in fulfilment of Protagoras’s statement “Man is the measure of all things”. This exhibition will be the first in a series to focus on important areas of the Museum’s famous permanent collection to guide future thinking about the display of one of the most important collections of sculpture in the world, allowing for a greater dialogue between the sculptures of different cultures.

Neil MacGregor, Director of the British Museum said, “This exhibition will be a celebration of the beauty and ideals of ancient Greek art. Some of the most beautiful works in the world will be brought together for the first time in a narrative exploring the highest achievements of ancient Greek artists and philosophers, exploring what it is to be human. I am hugely grateful to Julius Baer for their generous support of the exhibition”.

Adam Horowitz, Head of Julius Baer International Limited, United Kingdom, said: “Julius Baer, the international reference in pure private banking, with a large footprint in the UK, is renowned not only for its long tradition in wealth management but also for its engagement with arts and culture over many decades. Both areas rely on partnerships, which are founded on trust and sharing a common goal. We are very proud to sponsor a major exhibition at the British Museum for the third consecutive time. Defining beauty: the body in ancient Greek art will provide exciting and vivid insights into the human body as it was expressed in ancient Greek art and thought.”

When: 26 March – 5 July 2015

Where: Sainsbury Exhibitions Gallery

Source: The British Museum [March 16, 2015]

"Heartbreaking" graffiti uncovered in a Cambridgeshire church has revealed how three sisters from one family died in a plague outbreak in 1515.

The names Cateryn, Jane and Amee Maddyngley and the date were inscribed on stonework in Kingston parish church.

It was found by Norfolk and Suffolk Medieval Graffiti Survey volunteers.

Archaeologist Matt Champion said the project had shown church plague graffiti was "far more common than previously realised".

"The most heartbreaking inscriptions are those that refer to long-dead children," he said.

The Maddyngley graffiti is hidden under limewash near the door in All Saints' and St Andrew's church.

The family lived in Kingston, seven miles from Cambridge, and were tenant farmers who "rarely turn up in parish records", he said.

Mr Champion believes Cateryn, Jane and Amee must have been children because their names are not found as adults in any of the records.

In 1515, there was an outbreak of bubonic plague in London which spread across south east England.

Mr Champion said Cambridge University suspended its classes and large gatherings of people were banned, "just as we see today with the Ebola outbreaks in Africa".

Children were particularly hard-hit and usually hastily buried in unmarked graves.

The graffiti survey was set up in 2010 and is the first attempt to survey pre-Reformation graffiti in churches since the late 1960s.

Volunteers use digital cameras and powerful lamps to reveal previously hidden or faded markings.

At least 60% of the 650 churches surveyed in Norfolk, Suffolk and north Essex have "significant amounts" of graffiti and volunteers have recorded up to 500 pieces in many of them.

The project has confirmed more graffiti is found to have been created during times of pestilence such as the Black Death of 1349 and subsequent outbreaks of plagues.

"It was a votive offering at a time where prayer counted," Mr Champion said.

Source: BBC News Website [February 21, 2015]

The highly anticipated exhibition From Ancient to Modern: Archaeology and Aesthetics, opens at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (ISAW) on February 12, 2015. With some 50 outstanding ancient objects, and more than 100 related documents, photographs, and drawings, this groundbreaking exhibition examines the fascinating process through which archaeological objects are transformed from artifacts to artworks and, sometimes, to popular icons, as they move from the sites of their discovery, to be publicized by mass media and exhibited by museums.

From Ancient to Modern: Archaeology and Aesthetics displays a series of spectacular early Mesopotamian objects alongside rich documentation, opening a window onto the ways in which archaeological finds of the 1920s and 1930s were transformed from artifacts into works of art. This process raises fundamental and critical questions: What biographies were initially given to these objects by their discoverers? How were these objects filtered through the eyes and voice of the press before they were seen by the public? How were the objects’ biographies affected by or reflective of the tastes of the time? How were the items presented in museums and received by artists of the period?

And finally, how do they continue to influence artistic practice today? The goal of Archaeology and Aesthetics is to demonstrate that these biographies do not begin and end in antiquity, or span the period from their discovery to the present, but continue to be written—through scholarly inquiry and reconsideration, through museum displays and the relationships they create between object and viewer, and through the ways in which they inspire artists of our time. The modern unearthing of an object is in fact the starting point for a multiplicity of approaches, each creating a better understanding of both the artifact and the people who produced it.

Archaeology and Aesthetics begins with a gallery devoted to a number of early Mesopotamian archaeological sites. Concentrating on the city of Ur and several sites in the Diyala River Valley, the display comprises many now-iconic objects, including a wide array of Sumerian stone sculptures, spectacular jewelry in a variety of precious and exotic materials, and such luxury items as ostrich-egg vessels and bronzes.

These exceptional artifacts are shown with field notebooks, excavator’s diaries, archival photography, and original newspaper clippings, among other archival items, illustrating the ways in which the finds were carefully described and presented to the press, the general public, and the academic community. Selected objects are followed as they are strategically presented to an international audience, effecting their transformation from archaeological artifact to aesthetic item.

The exhibition continues with a gallery devoted to twentieth- and twenty-first-century artistic responses to ancient Mesopotamian objects. As these artifacts began to make their way into museums across pre-World War II Europe and North America, artists including Alberto Giacometti, Henry Moore, and Willem de Kooning drew inspiration from what they saw as a new kind of energy and vision inherent to the material.

Today, many artists return to the archaeological object to explore its role as a window onto human history and cultures rather than as an aesthetic object. Archaeology and Aesthetics demonstrates this approach with work by Jananne al-Ani, who was born in Kirkuk, Iraq, and lives in London, and by the Chicago-based Michael Rakowitz, who is of Iraqi-Jewish heritage. Both create art expressive of the traumatic loss of human heritage caused by wars and the spreading conflict in the Near and Middle East.

“From Ancient to Modern: Archaeology and Aesthetics” runs through June 7 at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World.

Source: Institute for the Study of the Ancient World [February 15, 2015]