Archaeology, features and articles | Educational Science

Dec 31, 2017

Dead Sea Scroll Remains a Puzzle After Scientists Crack its Code

Scholars have deciphered a Dead Sea Scroll written in a Hebrew code, finding that it contains part of a 364-day calendar of holy days. The calendar notes the day of Sabbaths, the start of seasons and the days of festivals and feasts. The scribe, who went to the trouble of...

Nov 30, 2019

An Ancient Egyptian Physician Cited As the 'First Woman Doctor' Likely Never Existed

Merit Ptah was an ancient Egyptian physician, often revered as the world's first female doctor. She was thought to live nearly 5,000 years ago...but she likely never existed, according to new findings. Merit Ptah was everywhere, from online posts about women in STEM and popular history books to computer games,...

Oct 31, 2019

Two Lion Cub Mummies Discovered in Egypt for the First Time

Two mummified lions, dating back about 2,600 years, have been discovered in a tomb full of cat statues and cat mummies in Saqqara, the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities announced today (Nov. 23) at a press conference. This is the first time [that a] complete mummy of a lion or lion...

Oct 31, 2019

Two-Horned 'Rook' Might Be the Oldest Chess Piece on Earth

In the game of chess, a rook can move as many spaces as it can in one direction. Or, it can sit stone-still and guard the pieces around it, potentially holding its ground for an entire match — or thousands of years (whichever comes first). John Oleson, an archaeologist at...

Sep 30, 2019

30 Perfectly Preserved Coffins Holding Ancient Egyptian Priest Mummies Discovered

Archaeologists have unearthed 30 sealed wooden coffins with mummies inside at El-Assasif, an ancient necropolis near Luxor, Egypt, Egypt's Ministry of Antiquities announced this morning (Oct. 19) at a press conference. Called the cachette of the priests because some of the mummies appear to be those of ancient Egyptian priests,...

Sep 30, 2019

Assyrian Tablets Contain Earliest Written Record of Aurora’s Sky Glow

Ancient Assyrian stone tablets represent the oldest known reports of auroras, dating to more than 2,500 years ago. The descriptions, written in cuneiform, were found on three stone tablets, dating from 655 B.C. to 679 B.C. They predate other known historical references to auroras by about a century, researchers reported...

Aug 31, 2019

The 'Spanish Stonehenge' Is Above Water for the First Time in 50 Years

After 50 years out of sight beneath the waters of a manmade lake in western Spain, the 7,000-year-old megalithic monument known as the Dolmen of Guadalperal is finally back on dry land — emphasis on dry. As new imagery taken from NASA's Landsat 8 satellite shows, the reappearance of the...

Jun 30, 2019

Philistines, Biblical Enemies of the Israelites, Were European, DNA Reveals

The ancient Philistines — famous for their appearances in the Hebrew Bible, including the story of David and the giant Philistine Goliath — weren't local to what is now modern-day Israel. Instead, this enigmatic group descended from a group of seafaring Europeans, a new study of ancient DNA finds. After...

May 31, 2019

What Are Rock Cairns?

Rock cairns are human-made stacks, mounds or piles of rocks. They take different forms, and have been built by cultures around the world for many different purposes. Cairns may serve as monuments, burial sites, navigational aids (by land or sea), or ceremonial grounds, among other uses. They may stand alone,...

Apr 30, 2019

In Photos: Ancient Cemetery Near Giza Pyramids

Giza cemetery (Image credit: Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities)Archaeologists working southeast of the Giza Pyramids have discovered part of a cemetery that dates back about 4,500 years. It contains a number of tombs and burials, the oldest of which dates to shortly after the Giza Pyramids were completed. [Read more about...

Mar 31, 2019

Offerings to Supernatural Deities Discovered in Lake Titicaca in the Andes

A team of archaeological divers has uncovered dazzling treasures at the bottom of Lake Titicaca, including a puma carved out of the blue gemstone lapis-lazuli, gold medallions and a turquoise stone pendant. These riches were likely offered to supernatural deities hundreds of years ago by elite people from the Tiwanaku...

Jan 31, 2019

Forgotten Parchments About King Arthur, Merlin and the Holy Grail Discovered in UK Library

The librarian hadn't fallen under a magical spell, but he still felt enchanted when he unexpectedly discovered seven handwritten parchments detailing the legendary adventures of Merlin and King Arthur. For years, the documents had lain hidden at the University of Bristol in England. The parchments were discovered in a book...

Jan 31, 2019

Search for Shackleton's Antarctic Shipwreck Turns Back to Avoid Deadly Ice Trap

The inclement weather and heavy ice also caused the loss of one of two autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) that had spent several days searching for the wreck on the seafloor. The AUVs were transported by the South African polar research ship Agulhas II. The expedition team announced today (Feb. 14)...

Jan 31, 2019

England's Oldest Cave-Art Site Is Covered with Signs to Ward off Evil Spirits

There's a cave in England where, during the last ice age, ancient people carved images of their world into the walls. Those renderings of bison, birds and reindeer are the only known examples of ice age rock art in Britain. But those same caves, Creswell Crags, were also the site...

Jan 31, 2019

5,600-Year-Old Human Skull Bone Fished Out of the Thames by Lucky 'Mudlarker'

Humans have lived alongside England's River Thames for thousands of years, and they've left some interesting things behind in its muddy waters: wooden clubs for bashing in heads, a toilet that fits three butts at once and sometimes, even bits of human skulls. Tomorrow (Feb. 20), the Museum of London...