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The carvings at Göbekli Tepe even show the movements of the constellations. Image credit: Dr Martin Sweatman Acataclysmic comet impact 13,000 years ago may have sparked the rise of civilization, according to the authors of a new study. The event – which many scientists believe never happened – may even be documented at the world-famous site of Göbekli Tepe, forming part of a series of carvings that the researchers say represent the world’s oldest solar calendar. Located in southern Türkiye, Göbekli Tepe is a pre-pottery Neolithic complex that is estimated to be around 12,000 years old. Analyzing an intricately carved...

Göbekli Tepe was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2018, and it's not hard to see why. Image credit: Resul Muslu/Shutterstock.com ============================================================================ Did a cataclysmic comet impact 13,000 years ago spark the rise of civilization? That's the explosive claim behind a study of carvings at the world-famous site of Göbekli Tepe, which researchers say encode not just a catastrophic comet strike, but the world's oldest solar calendar. Located in southern Türkiye, Göbekli Tepe is a pre-pottery Neolithic complex that is estimated to be around 12,000 years old. Analyzing an intricately carved pillar at the site, the study authors propose...

According to a statement released by the Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, an international team of researchers compared models for the distribution of three major mosquito complexes, paleoclimate models, and places where early humans lived in sub-Saharan Africa between 5,000 and 74,000 years ago. The resulting map indicates that people avoided or died out in areas where Plasmodium falciparum-induced malaria, a disease transmitted by mosquitoes, was likely prevalent. "The effects of these choices shaped human demography for the last 74,000 years, and likely much earlier," said Andrea Manica of the University of Cambridge. "By fragmenting human societies across the landscape,...

New genetic research is reshaping how scientists understand ancient relationships between early humans and Neanderthals. A study published in Science suggests that mating between Homo sapiens women and Neanderthal men occurred more often than the reverse, leaving a lasting mark on the human genome. The finding helps explain a long-standing mystery in genetics. Modern humans carry small amounts of Neanderthal DNA across most of their genome, but almost none on the X chromosome. These gaps, known as Neanderthal deserts, puzzled scientists for years. Modern humans and Neanderthals split from a shared ancestor about 600,000 years ago. Human ancestors evolved in...

NEW YORK (AP) — Humans and Neanderthals cozied up from time to time when they lived in the same areas tens of thousands of years ago. But we don’t know much about who got with whom, or why. A new genetic analysis offers some ancient gossip: The pairings were more often female humans with male Neanderthals. How exactly this happened remains a huge question mark. Did human women venture into Neanderthal populations, or were the Neanderthal males drawn to larger human enclaves? Were these interactions peaceful, confusing, secretive or even violent? “I don’t know if we’ll ever get a definitive...

Who were the Celts really? Mythical druids of legend or feared warriors of antiquity? Deep inside the European Alps, sealed salt mines have preserved astonishing evidence of a powerful civilisation that flourished more than 3,000 years ago. These people were neither barbarians nor island dwellers -- they were the rulers of a vast Kingdom of Salt, enriched by one of the most valuable resources of the ancient world. Now, a remarkable discovery raises new questions. Inside a 2,400-year-old Celtic tomb, the remains of an aristocratic woman and two unusually large men are uncovered. Were they relatives, ritual sacrifices, or part...

Wisconsin officials recently announced the discovery of a trove of ancient canoes in an underwater "parking lot" of sorts — including one that predates the Pyramids of Giza. The Wisconsin Historical Society (WHS) announced this month that its experts have identified 14 canoes in Madison's Lake Mendota so far, six of which were found this spring. The WHS worked with the First Nations of Wisconsin during the research process, a release noted.

The straits that separate the Lesser Sundas from Bali and Java are deep, and powerful ocean currents run through them: so significant is this barrier that it has contributed to the development of what is termed the Wallace Line, a biogeographical boundary that divides the floras and faunas of Australasia in the south from the Asian ecosystems to the north. Currents might be more favourable if one approached from the north-east, through Borneo and the island of Sulawesi, and intriguingly, recent findings indicate archaic hominid settlement there reaching back over a million years. Even the approach to Sulawesi itself, however,...

Researchers studying prehistoric artifacts believe the earliest evidence of humans recording numbers may lie in simple bone markings made up to 20,000 years ago. The study, led by Lloyd Austin Courtenay and published in Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences, explores how these marks could reveal the origins of numerical thinking. Simple marks, complex meaning The research examines “artificial memory systems,” or AMSs—objects engraved with repeated marks believed to store information outside the human mind. These marks are found on bones, antlers, and sticks dating back to the Upper Paleolithic period. Some artifacts carry hundreds of lines, carefully spaced and organized. Such...

The southern coast of the French region of Brittany is home to one of Europe's highest concentrations of mysterious megalithic standing stones. More than 10,000 are strewn around a six-mile stretch in the Carnac region, from La Trinité-sur-Mer to Erdeven. Unlike other megalithic monuments, such as Stonehenge, these do not typically form a circle, but are linear or curvilinear in nature. In the past, it has been difficult for archaeologists to accurately ascertain their age. According to a statement released by the University of Gothenburg, new research suggests that that not only are they even older than expected, but they...

For thousands of years, animal teeth have been used as jewelry or ornaments on clothing by human societies around the world. Until now, however, archaeologists have given little thought to the process of how people obtained these animal teeth, especially since keeping them unbroken was difficult but essential. According to a statement released by the University of Helsinki, researchers recently used experimental archaeology to determine the methods likely used thousands of years ago before modern tools. The team examined evidence from the Zvejnieki cemetery in Latvia, where more than 2,000 animal teeth were found in graves dating to between 7500...

Stonehenge is a big seller. Which is crazy, because there is sooo much more out there for us to see, explore and learn about. This is just one of many examples. Oh and it has the plus point of being the oldest that we know of! The Original Stonehenge - You've Not Heard Of | 8:21 Paul Whitewick | 172K subscribers | 27,971 views | March 30, 2025

At the foot of Slovakia's Štiavnické vrchy hills, a long-forgotten hilltop settlement is giving up its secrets. Using state-of-the-art aerial scanning technology, researchers have uncovered remnants of stone structures and terraced fields stretching down the valley slopes – evidence of a rich and complex past. Their precise age remains a mystery, writes the My Levice website.A team of geoinformatics experts from the Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava has mapped the 140-hectare site using LIDAR (Light Detection and Ranging), an advanced laser scanning system.The technology has not only exposed previously unknown locations but also shed new light on prehistoric fields...

The entrance to the Maszycka Cave in southern Poland (Credit: Darek Bobak) In a nutshell * Scientists found evidence of cannibalism in an 18,000-year-old Polish cave, where at least ten people — including children — were systematically butchered and eaten, likely due to territorial conflicts rather than survival needs * The Magdalenian people who created famous cave art like Lascaux were capable of both sophisticated cultural achievements and extreme violence, challenging our understanding of prehistoric societies * As populations grew after the last Ice Age, competition for resources likely led to violent conflicts between groups, with evidence of similar cannibalism...

How did early hunter-gatherers manage to survive in some of the most inhospitable places on Earth, and could pieces of one of the world's oldest pots hold a clue?Prof Alice Roberts journeys to Asia, the world's greatest land mass, and attempts to replicate ancient survival techniques that appear to have been passed down through many generations. With little precedent and only the most primitive resources available, our ancestors' innovation and experimentation was vital for their success.This clip is from Incredible Human Journey (2009).What Turned Hunter-Gatherers Into Empire Builders? | 4:44BBC Timestamp | 785K subscribers | 6,728 views | November 13,...

In November 2023 we we visited Çatalhöyük as part of the Göbekli Tepe to Stonehenge project (https://buymeacoffee.com/prehistoryguys). We were not there for long, but as you can imagine, we were left with a lasting impression.Here we present an introduction to and an overview of the site - coupled with our own personal observations and reflections. We hope you find it valuable and enlightening. For too long, it has lived in the shadow of the other Turkish mega-site some 500 miles to the east! Çatalhöyük: "it's about the people" - 7,000 BC mega-site revealed. | 35:20The Prehistory Guys | 84K subscribers...

Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania recently released a study on the potential evolutionary benefits of ADHD. They analyzed data from 457 adults who played an online foraging game, where the objective was to collect as many berries as possible within an eight minute span. Players could choose to either keep collecting berries from the bushes in their original location, or move to a new patch. (By the way, this sounds an awful lot like a game I used to play on Neopets!) Moving would cost them a brief time out, and there was no guarantee that the patch would...

It’s difficult to comprehend within our limited, double-digit life spans, but Earth is a dynamic planet that is constantly changing. The continents have crashed together and separated a handful of times now (Pangaea is the latest supercontinent, but not the only one), and the planet’s atmosphere, oceans, and orbit are all temporary and movable. Take, for instance, Antarctica, arguably the most inhospitable place on the planet. Not long ago (geologically speaking), the icy continent wasn’t frozen at all. In fact, it was filled with temperate rainforests teeming with life. Some 90 million years ago, during the Cretaceous Period — the...

A burial monument with human remains thought to be about 4,500 years old has been discovered in East Yorkshire.Parts of a Roman road and a burnt mound were also discovered during a £5m project to build a 5.2km (3.2 miles) sewer near Full Sutton.Ecus Archaelogy, working on the site for Yorkshire Water, said the three sites give a glimpse into the prehistoric and early historic past of the area.The analysis stage of the project is yet to start and the sewer is now being laid.The small circular burial monument was discovered in the vicinity of Full Sutton with the human...

Cover Photo: An artist’s reconstruction shows how a Neanderthal could hold a stone artifact with an adhesive handle. Daniela Greiner ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ More than 40,000 years ago, Neanderthals in what is now France used a multi-component adhesive to make handles for stone tools. They produced a sophisticated mixture of ochre and bitumen, two raw materials that had to be procured from the wider region. This is the earliest discovery of a multi-component adhesive in Europe to date. This complex adhesive found on Neanderthal stone tools has given researchers new insights into the intelligence of this extinct human species. The work, reported...