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A large Bronze Age debris deposit in Mycenae, Greece provides important data for understanding the history of animal resources at the site, according to a study published March 1, 2023 in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Jacqueline Meier of the University of North Florida and colleagues.Animals were an important source of subsistence and symbolism at the Late Bronze Age site of Mycenae in Greece, as evidenced by their depictions in art and architecture, but more research is needed on the animals that actually lived there. In this study, researchers performed a detailed analysis of a large deposit of animal...

...Archaeologists accidentally discovered the world's earliest horseback riders while studying skeletons found beneath 5,000-year-old burial mounds in Europe and Asia... part of the so-called Yamnaya culture, groups of semi-nomadic people who swept across Europe and western Asia, bringing the precursor to the Indo-European language family with them...The new analysis came from 217 human skeletons from the Pontic-Caspian steppe, a geographical area that runs roughly from Bulgaria to Kazakhstan... 5,000-year-old horse skeletons show wear on their teeth that could have been from bridles, while others have found possible fenced enclosures. In the same time period, horse milk peptides have been detected...

Elephant Bird Egg What a whole Aepyornis egg would have looked like when freshly laid, seen in a market near the town of Toliara on the southwest coast of Madagascar. Credit: Gifford Miller More than 1,200 years ago, flightless elephant birds roamed the island of Madagascar and laid eggs bigger than footballs. While these ostrich-like giants are now extinct, new research from the University of Colorado at Boulder (CU Boulder) and Curtin University in Australia reveals that their eggshell remnants hold valuable clues about their time on Earth. Published on February 28 in the journal Nature Communications, the study describes...

The Sandhills of North Carolina is said to be the only place in the world where bees produce purple honey, an iridescent concoction that looks more like alien goo than the sweet nectar we know and love. It sounds like the stuff of legends, something to lure honey and beekeeping aficionados from around the world, but this extremely rare liquid is quite real. Purple honey is said to be sweeter than the amber kind and apparently has some subtle fruit notes as well. Purple honey is a rare treat that usually commands a higher price than the amber kind, but...

A new study has found that foods featured in the keto diet — which prioritizes high amounts of fat and low amounts of carbs — produce the most carbon emissions of six popular diets, while the vegan diet is associated with the lowest carbon footprint. (Photo by iStock) For those on keto or paleo diets, this may be tough to swallow. A new study from Tulane University which compared popular diets on both nutritional quality and environmental impact found that the keto and paleo diets, as eaten by American adults, scored among the lowest on overall nutrition quality and were...

A hen from Michigan, United States, has been crowned the world’s oldest living chicken at an impressive age of 20 years 304 days as of March 1st, 2023. The elderly hen named Peanut was raised from birth by Marsi Darwin, a retired librarian, according to Guinness World Records.

A quahog clam found at Florida's Alligator Point was determined by researchers to be about 214 years old. Photo courtesy of the Gulf Specimen Marine Lab/Facebook Feb. 27 (UPI) -- A 2.6-pound quahog claim that made a rare visit to the Florida coast is believed by researchers to be 214 years old. Blaine Parker said he was collecting shellfish to make chowder at Alligator Point, on St. James Island in Franklin County when he found the gigantic quahog clam, an Atlantic species found most often north of North Carolina. "We were just going to eat it, but we thought about...

In the summer of 1495, King Hans of Denmark and Norway anchored his warship off the southern coast of Sweden. While Hans was on land, his vessel—known as Gribshunden or Griffen—mysteriously caught fire and sank to the bottom of the Baltic Sea.Hans was on his way to Kalmar, where he hoped to be elected king of Sweden and reunite the broader Nordic region under a single ruler. As such, Hans brought many opulent status symbols, including luxurious foods and spices, to help persuade the Swedish leadership to agree to his plan.Remarkably, many of those foods and spices have survived underwater...

In a cave just south of Lisbon, archaeological deposits conceal a Paleolithic dinner menu. As well as stone tools and charcoal, the site of Gruta de Figueira Brava contains rich deposits of shells and bones with much to tell us about the Neanderthals that lived there—especially about their meals. A study published in Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology shows that 90,000 years ago, these Neanderthals were cooking and eating crabs...A wide variety of shellfish remains were found in the archaeological remains Nabais and her colleagues studied, but the shellfish in the undisturbed Paleolithic deposits are overwhelmingly represented by brown crabs. Their...

On the muddy shores of a lake in east-central Germany, Neanderthals gathered some 125,000 years ago to butcher massive elephants. With sharp stone tools, they harvested up to 4 tons of flesh from each animal, according to a new study that is casting these ancient human relatives in a new light. The degree of organization required to carry out the butchery—and the sheer quantity of food it provided—suggests Neanderthals could form much larger social groups than previously thought.The find comes from a trove of animal bones and stone tools uncovered in the 1980s by coal miners near the town of...

Researchers have discovered a 5,000-year-old tavern hidden 19 inches underground in southern Iraq, according to a Jan. 23 press release from the University of Pennsylvania (Penn). Archaeologists from the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Pisa conducted the excavation beginning in 2019, Smithsonian Magazine reported. The team used advanced technology, including drone imagery and magnetometry, to identify the site’s layout. The site, located in the ancient city of Lagash, offers clues about the lives of everyday people who lived in southern Mesopotamia around 2700 B.C.E. Inside the open-air eating space, archaeologists found benches, an oven, a clay refrigerator called...

The most numerous species of bird on earth has influenced culture, religion, and even language. The History Guy remembers the forgotten historical contributions of the chicken. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Non censuram.Why did the Chicken Cross the Road? Chickens and Forgotten HistoryThe History Guy: History Deserves to Be Remembered1.14M subscribers | 596,985 views | April 25, 2019

A number of decapitated skeletons have been uncovered by archaeologists at a Roman burial site.The discovery, which included evidence of Roman and Iron Age settlements, was made at Wintringham near St Neots, Cambridgeshire.Dating from 2,500 years ago, the site will feature in the latest series of BBC Two's Digging for Britain...The work comes ahead of a development of about 2,800 homes in the village.Archaeologists uncovered an Iron Age settlement composed of 40 roundhouses and a network of trackways and enclosures related to farming activities.The Oxford Archaeology team also discovered Roman coins, brooches, a large lead lid or platter, and numerous...

Indigenous dogs roamed Jamestown in the early 17th century, and out of desperation during harsh winter months, some colonists ate them, researchers have proven.A team of archaeologists at the University of Iowa was able to extract DNA from remains found at Jamestown and confirm that they belonged to ancient dogs that were likely wolf or coyote-sized.It's the first time proof has ever been found that indigenous dogs were at Jamestown in the 17th century. The bones are part of an artifact collection owned by Jamestown Rediscovery, part of the historic preservation group called Preservation Virginia."They have lineages reaching back to...

How did people live and die during the harshest months of the year? How did they stay warm? What did they eat? How did they keep themselves entertained in an age before modern day luxuries like electric blankets, double glazing, and Netflix? The onset of the Little Ice Age, between 1300 until about 1870 meant that the long, dark winters of the Late Middle Ages were colder and more dangerous. With starvation and death from illness always threatening to strike, winter was a frightening time. Welcome to Medieval Madness.Surviving Winter in the Middle Ages... | MedievalMadness | 178K subscribers |...

For most of human history, the disasters wrought by nature were utterly unpredictable, their causes wholly unknown. They were merely a random act of God that could lay waste to whole cities without warning. On the morning of May 20, 1202, thousands of people across an enormous swath of the Earth experienced such destruction.The Forgotten 1202 earthquakeThe History Guy: History Deserves to Be Remembered1.13M subscribers | 79,737 views | December 12, 2022

The authors combine pollen, spores, sedimentary DNA, and animal remains to characterize the pre-Neolithic habitat of the site, inferring partially open woodland conditions, which would have been beneficial to large grazing herbivores like aurochs, as well as hunter-gatherer communities. This study supports previous evidence that the Stonehenge region was not covered in closed canopy forest at this time, as has previously been proposed.This study also provides date estimates for human activity at Blick Mead. Results indicate that hunter-gatherers used this site for 4,000 years up until the time of the earliest known farmers and monument-builders in the region, who would...

Striations and residue found on stone tools in China reflect harvesting methods.Anew Dartmouth-led study analyzing stone tools from southern China provides the earliest evidence of rice harvesting, dating to as early as 10,000 years ago. The researchers identified two methods of harvesting rice, which helped initiate rice domestication...Wild rice is different from domesticated rice in that wild rice naturally sheds ripe seeds, shattering them to the ground when they mature, while cultivated rice seeds stay on the plants when they mature.To harvest rice, some sort of tools would have been needed. In harvesting rice with tools, early rice cultivators were...

RECIPE LINKS AT SITE..................... NATIONAL BOUILLABAISSE DAY National Bouillabaisse Day on December 14th gives seafood lovers everywhere a reason to celebrate. This flavorful fish stew hits the spot on cold winter’s day, too. #NationalBouillabaisseDay The French are known for many great recipes. Their food inspires travel to France for a taste of authentic dishes. Bouillabaisse tops the list of must-have cuisine while visiting France. The tasty stew originates in the port city of Marseille. It is traditionally made using bony rockfish, saffron, fennel seed, and orange zest. However, in the culinary world, strong opinions bounce around about the proper ingredients...

A canine humerus recovered from Erralla cave in the Basque Country, Spain in 1985 has now been dated to between 17,410 and 17,096 years ago. And multiple lines of analysis confirm it's not from a wolf, but a dog: Canis familiaris. This means that old, cracked humerus represents the oldest dog bone to date. That's an incredible datapoint for contextualizing dog domestication, and opens up new discussions about the timeline and the nature of remains of "dog-like wolves" thought to be an intermediate stage between wolves and dogs. When and how dogs diverged from their wolf (Canis lupus) ancestors, and...