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An imaging project is designed to help save the iconic Mount Rushmore from the effects of weather, physical erosion and more... I always have been fascinated by the Mount Rushmore National Memorial (Keystone, S.D.); ever since noted New York Times Magazine photographer Sam Falk gave me an image he took of Gutzon Borglum’s sculpture. When Falk presented me with his photograph in the 1960s, little did anyone realize that the effects of erosion—although not yet readily apparent—already had taken hold. Carving of the monument actually began in 1927 and finally was completed in 1941. Although jurisdiction over Mount Rushmore was...

People living in Roman Britain had healthier gums than their modern-day descendants, a feat of archaeological dentistry shows. A team at King's College London and the Natural History Museum found only 5% of adults had gum disease in the Roman, and certainly pre-toothbrush, era. Modern day smoking and type 2 diabetes are blamed for a figure of nearly one in three today. But ancient Britain was certainly not a golden age of gleaming gnashers. The smiles of our ancestors were littered with infections, abscesses and tooth decay, the study showed... The research group analysed 303 skulls from a burial ground...

Seven residents of a Giza district have been arrested after they illegally excavated the area beneath their home and found the remains of an ancient Egyptian temple. The huge limestone blocks, engraved with hieroglyphic texts, date from the reign of the New Kingdom's King Tuthmose III, and were found in the Hod Zeleikha area of Al-Badrasheen district. The find was made two weeks ago, according to Major General Momtaz Fathi, an aide to the interior ministry and a director in the tourism police. A unit from the tourism and antiquities police heard of the illegal excavation work and arrested the...

Liyangan archaeological site on the slope of Mount Sindoro in Temanggung regency, Central Java, has again proven its position as home to one of main archeological findings in Indonesia after archeologists from the Yogyakarta Archeology Agency found the fossilized remnants of staple foods, comprising maize and rice, still inside a bamboo basket at the site. The archeologists said the finding indicated that Indonesia had long been part of an international agriculture network because maize was not endemic to Java and at the site they had also found many artifacts from other countries, especially China. Head of the Yogyakarta Archeology Agency,...

In 1594, soldiers loyal to Queen Elizabeth I, sent to relieve a garrison besieged by Irish chieftain Hugh Maguire in Enniskillen Castle, were ambushed as they crossed the Arney River... and their supplies were thrown into the river. It became known as the Battle of the Ford of the Biscuits. According to the history books it took place near Drumane Bridge, close to the modern main road between Enniskillen and Dublin... Local people, like farmer Maurice Owens, thought they knew otherwise from the stories passed down through the generations. "We were always told that the battle took place down here...

Archaeology shows that these fierce women also smoked pot, got tattoos, killed—and loved—men. The Amazons got a bum rap in antiquity. They wore trousers. They smoked pot, covered their skin with tattoos, rode horses, and fought as hard as the guys. Legends sprang up like weeds. They cut off their breasts to fire their bows better! They mutilated or killed their boy children! Modern (mostly male) scholars continued the confabulations. The Amazons were hard-core feminists. Man haters. Delinquent mothers. Lesbians. Drawing on a wealth of textual, artistic, and archaeological evidence, Adrienne Mayor, author of The Amazons, dispels these myths and...

They may have been plant-eaters, but stegosaurs were no easy prey: Researchers have found the fossil remains of what might be a deadly wound inflicted by the creature's spiked tail. Stegosaur tails have been a matter of some debate. While paleontologists used to say they were only for decoration, recent studies have suggested that the spiked, dexterous tails were actually used in combat. In 2005, researchers reported that a non-fatal wound found in the fossil of an allosaur -- a fearsome predator of stegosaurus's age -- was most likely inflicted by a stegosaur tail. But it turns out that those...

A genetic analysis of a 45,000-year-old thigh bone narrows down the time when modern humans and Neanderthals first interbred.A 45,000-year-old leg bone is raising questions about just how close modern-day humans are to our thick-browed Stone Age ancestors. DNA from the femur of a Siberian man is helping to pinpoint when modern humans and Neanderthals first interbred, researchers say. But what does this mean for the human connection to a species that disappeared nearly 30,000 years ago? The thigh bone, spotted six years ago on the banks of the Irtysh River in Siberia by a Russian artist who carves jewelry...

Their purpose is unknown, and archaeologists are unsure when these structures were built. Analysis of the photographs, as well as artifacts found on the ground, suggest the circles date back at least 2,000 years, but they may be much older. They could even have been constructed in prehistoric times, before writing was invented, scientists say. Though the Big Circles were first spotted by aircraft in the 1920s, little research has focused on these structures, and many scientists are not even aware of their existence, something these archaeologists hope the new aerial images will help to change. The "most important contribution...

4000-Year-Old Phaistos Disk Decoded October 28, 2014 Scientists have been trying to decipher the mysterious “Phaistos Disk” markings ever since the clay disk from the Second Millenium B.C. was first discovered in 1908 on the Greek island of Crete. And it seems like they’ve finally cracked the code. At 4,000 years old, the relic dates back to the Minoan civilization and features an inscription that boasts a mysterious language, with symbols on both sides in a spiral configuration, which can be read inward from the outside rim. Researchers have been studying the puzzling artifact since its discovery, and now Dr....

Viruses preserved in ancient samples provide valuable information about viral diversity from long ago; they help us trace how today's species evolved and study their biology. However, it is not easy to recreate ancient viruses. Even when they are preserved in ancient specimens, they are somewhat degraded and their concentrations are low. Now, a new study led by the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), shows how it is possible, using modern techniques in the field of molecular genetics, to recreate ancient viruses from cryogenically preserved materials

Oct 23, 2014Bob Yirka Homo floresiensis adult female - model of head. (Phys.org) —It's been ten years since the bones of Homo floresiensis, aka, the "hobbit" were uncovered in Liang Bua, a cave, on the island of Flores in Indonesia, and scientists still can't agree on the diminutive hominin's origins. This month, the journal Nature has printed a comment piece by Chris Stringer of the Natural History Museum in London and two pieces by Ewen Callaway, one a retrospective with interviews with the central players, and the other a podcast with the four principle scientists involved in the find—Bert Roberts,...

Could one of aviation's most enduring mysteries be solved? An aircraft recovery group says it may already have a part of Amelia Earhart's plane, and it thinks it knows where to find the rest of it. The International Historic Aircraft Recovery Group says new testing of a piece of metal found in the vast waters of the Pacific Ocean in 1991 gives the group "increasing confidence" that it's a part of the Lockheed Electra. In a press release the group argues that the aluminum debris is likely a patch that Earhart had put on her plane in place of a...

BEAUFORT | One cannon was raised and another found as state underwater archaeologists closed out their latest dive at the Queen Anne’s Revenge shipwreck site. Crews were cleaning up Monday after a three-week fall dive expedition that focused on the large pile of artifacts molded together in a cement-like mass of iron and sand at the ship’s midsection. The plan was to bring up two small cannon at the uppermost layer, but that changed somewhat as work to free one of the guns from the mass revealed a new discovery. “We were only able to bring up one of the...

GAINESVILLE, Fla. – The divers descended 410 feet into the Mediterranean off Italy, shining bright lights on a ship that sank thousands of years ago. A sea-crusted anchor rested amid piles of terra cotta jars traditionally used to carry wine, olive oil and other cargo.

A mysterious symbol-covered disc which was found in Greek ruins in 1908 has finally revealed its secrets after archaeologists battled to decode it for more than a century. The Phaistos Disc - described as the ‘first Minoan CD-ROM’ is covered in 241 images, thought to be fragments of 45 mysterious symbols. The language used is unknown, and the technology behind the disc is equally mysterious. The disc was created in 1,700 BC - using pre-printed symbols to press a mysterious message into clay. The disc pre-dates the printing press by thousands of years, but uses a similar technology - which...

Few are the lands that can boast a history as deep and rich as Iraq and nowhere is that more apparent than in Baghdad's Iraqi museum ... "They are people from another planet," he says. "They take pride in nothing. Their mentality is completely petrified. They don't think of all this as the accomplishments of humanity. Aliens with an alien ideology, bent on destroying millennia of history. Read More at: http://www.foxillinois.com/news/features/top-stories/stories/isis-destroying-pawning-ancient-artifacts-2098.shtml

Christian Bale has some novel interpretations of Moses, whom he portrays in the upcoming "Exodus: God and Kings." "I think the man was likely schizophrenic and was one of the most barbaric individuals that I ever read about in my life," Bale said. Hard on the heels of Noah, which took great liberties with the biblical tale, Exodus is drawing criticism from Christian websites.

A powerful earthquake in Alaska sent towering waves up to 30 feet (9 meters) tall crashing down on Hawaii about 500 years ago, leaving behind fragments of coral, mollusk shells and coarse beach sand in a sinkhole located on the island of Kauai, new research finds. The quake, likely a magnitude 9.0, sent the mighty waves toward Hawaii sometime between 1425 and 1665, the study found. It's possible that another large Alaskan earthquake could trigger a comparable tsunami on Hawaii's shores in the future, experts said. The tsunami was at least three times the size of the damaging 1946 tsunami,...

Myths Studied for Tsunami CluesUniversity of Washington Scientist Probes Indian Myth for Tsunami Clues S E A T T L E, Aug. 12 — When scientists figured out that sea water drowned groves of tall trees up and down the coast of Washington state the same year a tsunami hit Japan, they theorized that a massive earthquake in the Pacific most likely triggered both events. Based on Japanese records, scientists were able to pinpoint a date Jan. 26, 1700 and estimate that the rupture of a long stretch of sea floor had caused a magnitude 9 quake, which would be...