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Throughout the history of human civilization, different cultures mourn and treat the dead differently. Some, like Tibetan Buddhists, have no use for burials as they dispose the dead by feeding corpses to vultures or by burning them in funeral pyres. Most cultures, however, show their respect by burying the dead, sometimes in complex and ornate tombs, crypts, and catacombs. This article takes a look at ten of the most fascinating final resting places around the world, from the largest prehistoric burial mound in Europe to the the tombs of pharaohs to the most beautiful mausoleum in the world:....

Archaeologists granted access to Japan's sacred tombs The divine origins of Japan's imperial family come under scrutiny as it allows limited access to two burial sites. Justin McCurry in Tokyo Thursday September 20, 2007 Guardian Unlimited (UK) Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko attend the opening ceremony of the World Athletics Championships in Osaka last month. Photograph: Michael Steele/Getty Images Japan's imperial household agency is to open the doors to some of the country's mysterious imperial tombs early next year after decades of pressure from archaeologists, in a move expected to anger ultra-conservatives. Experts have long been denied access to the...

Bodies to be stacked double in old graves By Jonathan Petre, Religion Correspondent Last Updated: 2:33am BST 06/06/2007 Graves are to be reopened to allow bodies to be stacked one on top of another in a controversial move announced by the Government yesterday. A consultation last year found that most people would accept 'double-decker' graves Bodies buried for as little as 75 years could be dug up and re-buried in deeper ground to allow another coffin to be interred above. The name of the newly-buried person could even be added to the headstone. This follows Government research which found that...

ROME (CNS) -- As a Peace Corps volunteer, Tom Bissell was hiking through a village in Kyrgyzstan one day, and an old Russian woman offered to take him to see the tomb of St. Matthew. "I remember thinking: 'The tomb of Matthew? I thought he was buried in Jerusalem or Italy or somewhere like that,'" Bissell recalled in an interview with Catholic News Service. But Kyrgyzstan, he soon learned, also had a claim on the apostle's final resting place. The woman led Bissell to the ruins of a monastery next to Lake Issyk Kul, where according to local legend...

Archaeologists excavate past glories from tombs www.chinaview.cn 2007-04-09 16:16:05 HOHHOT, April 9 (Xinhua) -- Archaeologists have unearthed more than 5,000 items dating back 2,000 years from a complex of 385 tombs uncovered at a construction site in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. The local cultural relics and archaeology authorities estimate the tombs cover an area of 50,000 sq m and must have been constructed sometime from the Warring States period (475 to 221 B.C.) to the Yuan Dynasty (1271 to 1368). They believe 285 of the tombs belong to the Warring States period, 43 belong to dynasties of the...

800-year-old tombs unearthed in N.China province www.chinaview.cn 2007-03-30 16:32:54 SHIJIAZHUANG, March 30 (Xinhua) -- Chinese archaeologists working in Shexian county in north China's Hebei province have discovered a group of 800-year-old tombs from the Song Dynasty (960-1279) and Jin Dynasty (1115-1234). Archaeologists with the Hebei provincial cultural relic research institute say that the tomb group, which covers an area of 2,600 square meters, comprises 17 tombs. The archaeologists have unearthed 146 historical artifacts from the tombs, including 126 copper coins, 15 china utensils, one silver earring, one copper ring, one crystal bead and a brick bearing a man's portrait. Initial...

Builders Discover 46 Ancient Tombs in Colombia 2007-02-22 11:06:18 Xinhua A group of construction workers stumbled upon 46 ancient tombs, between 1,500 and 2,500 years old while digging to build a new soccer stadium in Deportivo Cali in southwestern Colombia, an archaeologist team said on Wednesday. The tombs were found in Malagana, on the basin of the Cauca River. Anthropologist Jose Rodriguez, who headed a team from Colombia's National University, said that the tombs showed evidence of cannibalism and warrior activities. On the building site, experts found human bones, primarily radius and ulna bones. Rodriguez said that this indicates ritual...

Every Easter season the anti-Jesus crowd comes out of the woodwork creating some "controversy" about Jesus. This latest one, like many, is years old and was dusted off for the latest round of baseless attacks on Jesus' historicity. Historian Paul L. Maier explains further: Thanks for the profusion of e-mails I’ve received over the last two days regarding the Talpiot tombs discovery in Jerusalem, a.k.a., “the Jesus Family Tomb” story. Some of you also suggested that “life seemed to be following art” so far as my A Skeleton in God’s Closet was concerned. Believe me, this is not the way...

French archaeologist says Ur royal tomb artifacts came from Burnt City TEHRAN, Dec. 14 (MNA) -- French archaeologist Michèle Casanova said that the artifacts unearthed from the royal tombs in the ancient Sumerian city of Ur came from Iran’s 5200-year-old Burnt City, the Persian service of CHN reported on Friday. “Now, we are almost certain that the beautiful artifacts discovered in the city of Ur had been brought from the Burnt City, Jiroft, and Central Asia. This fact raises many questions, including why trade relations were established between the regions,” Casanova said. Casanova, who is also an expert on ornamental...

Peruvian workers clean graves containing a trove of pre-Inca artifacts in Ferrenafe, Peru, Tuesday, Nov. 21, 2006. Archaeologists in northern Peru said Tuesday they have unearthed 22 artifact-rich graves containing a trove of pre-Inca artifacts, including the first 'tumi' ceremonial knives ever excavated scientifically. The more than 900-year-old tombs were found next to a pyramid in the Pomac Forest Historical Sanctuary, about 680 kilometers (420 miles) northwest of the capital, Lima. They are from the Sican culture, which flourished on Peru's northern desert coast from A.D. 750 to 1375. (AP Photo/Martin Mejia) Archaeologists said Tuesday they have unearthed 22...

SAQQARA, Egypt - The arrest of tomb robbers led archaeologists to the graves of three royal dentists, protected by a curse and hidden in the desert sands for thousands of years in the shadow of Egypt's most ancient pyramid, officials announced Sunday. The thieves launched their own dig one summer night two months ago but were apprehended, Zahi Hawass, chief of Egypt's Supreme Council of Antiquities, told reporters. That led archaeologists to the three tombs, one of which included an inscription warning that anyone who violated the sanctity of the grave would be eaten by a crocodile and a snake,...

Phoenician tombs found in Sicily 40 sarcophagi unearthed at necropolis near ancient colony (ANSA) - Marsala (Trapani), August 23 - Archaeologists have unearthed 40 sarcophagi in what was once the sacred Phoenician burial grounds of Birgi, near the ancient colony of Motya . The tombs were discovered by chance by a group of construction workers excavating the foundations of a house close to the westernmost tip of Sicily near Marsala, culture officials said . Archaeologists said the sarcophagi were made of simple stone slabs and resembled those found on display outside the museum on the neighbouring island of Motya (present-day...

Tombs of Roman foes discoveredTerracotta, daggers and jewelry in Abruzzo necropolis (ANSA) - L'Aquila, June 7 - Fresh tombs of one of Rome's most implacable foes have been discovered in Italy's mountainous Abruzzo region . Some of the tombs have been dated to the Second Century BC, when Rome was still trying to subdue the warlike peoples that lived in the region . Others date as far back as the 8th century BC, before Rome was founded . A particularly interesting find was a 2nd-Century BC chamber tomb containing terracotta ware, jewelry and a dagger . "It's fascinating to see...

Over 4,200 Cliff Tombs Found in W. China City 2006-1-10 1:06:53 CRIENGLISH.com More than 4,220 cliff tombs have been spotted at 680 sites in Shangluo, a city in western China's Shaanxi Province, local archaeologists said Monday. The cliff tombs have large spaces and various conformations and are scattered at a 160-km-long belt joining DanJiang Valley in the east and the Qianyou River in the west, said scientists with the provincial archeological research institute. According to Yang Yachang, a researcher with the institute, most of the single-room tombs are erect stone caves in rectangle shapes and are three meters deep, while...

Chinese Archaeologists Find Ancient Tombs Mon Oct 17,11:31 PM ET BEIJING - Archaeologists have unearthed a 1,700-year-old complex of tombs in eastern China that contain bronze mirrors, porcelains and ancient money, a news report said Tuesday. ADVERTISEMENT The tombs near the port city of Ningbo were uncovered by a forklift operator working at a construction site, the official Xinhua News Agency reported. The report didn't say who was buried in the tombs or how many bodies had been found. Inscriptions in the tombs indicate they were built in 256 A.D., the report said, citing Ding Youfu, a member of the...

Mysteries of the Xiaohe Tombs in Xinjiang, China The Epoch Times Jun 10, 2005 A bird's-eye view of the Xiaohe Tombs. (Zhang Hongchi) On April 17, 2004, the Xiaohe ("Small River") Tombs in Xinjiang Province, discovered in 1939 by Swedish archaeologist Folke Bergman, were said to be among China's top 10 archaeological discoveries. According to a Guangming Daily report from April 23, public interest in the tombs was first sparked when Bergman published a detailed introduction to the Xiaohe basin archaeology called the Archaeological Researches in Xinjiang in Stockholm in 1939. However, when the tombs' landmark Xiaohe River dried up,...

Excavation of ancient desert tombs ends, riddles waiting to answer www.chinaview.cn 2005-03-20 15:33:59 URUMQI, March 20 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese archaeologists finished the excavation of an ancient tomb complex in the Lop Nur Desert, northwest China, but researchers say the finds are puzzling and need more time to be understood. By mid March, archaeologists in Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region unearthed 163 tombs of the Xiaohe Tomb complex, which sprawls on a 2,500-square-meter oval-shaped dune, 174 km from the ruins of the Loulan Kingdom, an ancient civilization that vanished 1,500 years ago. The complex contains about 330 tombs, but about 160 of...

Ancient tombs of unknown ethnic group discovered in Mazandaran TEHRAN, May 10 (MNA) -- Archaeologists working at the Laforak Cemetery in Savadkuh of Mazandaran Province recently discovered the remains of three skeletons with dolichocephalic skulls, anthropologist Farzad Foruzanfar announced on Tuesday. Of the fifteen graves excavated in the 2800-year old cemetery, three were different, in that they contained three skeletons with dolichocephalic (long-headed) skulls which were covered with a layer of earthenware, and their walls were reinforced by earthenware, too, he added. Experts have surmised that the three people belonged to a non-indigenous nation, since the inhabitants of Mazandaran at...

MEDA'IN SALEH, Saudi Arabia (Reuters) - Sheltered from the world by an ancient religious curse and modern Middle East conflict, a spectacular ruined city lies almost hidden in the northern deserts of Saudi Arabia. More than 100 tombs and burial chambers are carved elaborately into rocky outcrops across the sands of this city, still bearing names and ornate religious symbols chipped into the sandstone 2,000 years ago. Nearby volcanic mountains, decorated with the 10,000-year-old art of prehistoric hunters, tower over a palm-filled oasis and an abandoned mud house village. Through them all snake the remains of an Ottoman railway, built...

Tomb's hexagonal shape supports theories Yomiuri Shimbun The mausoleum in Marukoyama in Asukamura, Nara Prefecture, is hexagonal, giving support to theories that have suggested the tomb belonged to a high-ranking prince, according to the municipal board of education. The mausoleum is the first hexagonal tomb to be found in the Asuka area, where there are many tombs of Imperial and aristocratic family members that date back to the late sixth and early seventh centuries, when Empress Suiko (554-628) ruled the region. Mausoleums were built in various shapes, but only a few hexagonal chambers have been discovered in the nation. Emperors,...