Buried for nearly 3,600 years, a rare statue of Egypt's King Neferhotep I has been brought to light in the ruins of Thebes by a team of French archaeologists.
Officials said on Saturday that the statue was unusual in that the king is depicted holding hands with a double of himself, although the second part of the carving remains under the sand and its form has been determined by the use of imaging equipment.
More pictures of the statue and site here.
It's been a while, but here's something from Mehr Oxford University carbon-14 dating Iranian salt men
Pieces of clothing and DNA samples from three of the four ancient salt men discovered in Iran were recently sent to Oxford University for carbon-14 dating.
Manijeh Hadian, an expert at Iran’s Research Center for the Protection and Renovation of Historical Relics, said on Monday that the Archaeological Department of Oxford University has special technology for the determination of the age of objects of organic origin by measurement of the radioactivity of their carbon content, which is known as radiocarbon dating.
We think this relates to this story which we fail to remember blogging about.
And mohr from Mehr Excavations begin at 6000-year-old Iranian mound
A team of Iranian and foreign archaeologists began a new phase of excavations on Sunday at the 6000-year-old Rahmatabad Tepe near Pasargadae in the Marvdasht region of Far Province, Masud Rezaii Monfared, the director of the Marvdasht Cultural Heritage and Tourism Office, announced.
Experts from the Parseh and Pasargadae Foundation and the Archaeology Institute of the University of Tehran led by Dr. Hassan Fazeli Nashli, and a number of U.S. archaeologists led by Reinhard Bernbeck and Susan Pollock from Binghamton University will be conducting the excavation.
Jewish home found in City of David
A Second Temple Jewish house has been uncovered in Jerusalem's ancient City of David, Israel's Antiquities Authority announced Sunday.
The 2,000 year old private home, which archeologists believe was part of a complex of homes belonging to affluent people, was discovered during an excavation at the history-rich site last month.
Ancient city threatened
THE discovery of a Greek temple in Albania has underlined the threat to the ancient city of Apollonia from development. A new road to the nearby coast, intended to open up the unexploited Adriatic coastline, would cut across former suburbs and divide the temple site from the city (The Times, April 25, 2005).
Jack Davis, of the University of Cincinnati, said: “A large stone temple, entirely unknown prior to our research, seems to have been built here in the Archaic or Classical period, between the 7th and 4th centuries BC.
“The temple at Bonjakët may be one of the earliest monumental Greek temples on the shores of the eastern Adriatic north of modern Greece.”
Saving Macchu Picchu
Peru to save Incas' Lost City from threat of tourists
Peru's National Institute of Culture has released a 10-year master plan that is aimed at conserving the ruins of Machu Picchu, where heavy tourism and nearby development hasendangered the so-called Lost City of the Incas.
With the defeat of the Shining Path terrorist movement in the 1990s, Peru has been "rediscovered" by the international tourism industry and the hordes of visitors are causing erosion and other damage to the archaeological site which extends over some 76,000 acres.
In addition, mummies dating from the Inca period are being exposed to the elements and wild orchids are threatened by the increasing pollution.
Leave those heels at home Cambodia mulls special shoes requirement for Angkor Wat tourists
Tourists to Cambodia's historic Angkor temples may soon be required to rent out special shoes to prevent further damage to the complex.
The kingdom's Apsara Authority, which manages Cambodia's premier tourist attraction, has signed a contract with an unnamed firm to provide temple-friendly shoes to Angkor's visitors, possibly for a fee.
"We have had the plan a long time already, but due to technical issues we have not yet worked it out," Tep Henn, Apsara's deputy director-general of tourism, told AFP, adding that experts were conducting tests and would provide feedback to the authority.
'Detectives' unearth secrets of the past
Artefacts dating back 4,000 years, unearthed at a burial site in Janabiya, are shedding more light on merchant movements during the Dilmun era. Dilmun seals found at the site are inscribed with an Indus Valley inscription. Indus Valley was an ancient civilisation that thrived in an area between Pakistan and India between 2,800BC and 1,800BC.
Archaeologists believe that these inscriptions may reveal that there was a merchant relationship between the Indus Valley civilisation and the Dilmun civilisation.
This is not the first time that Indus Valley inscriptions have been found on Dilmun seals, but it is rare, said archaeology and heritage acting director Khalid Al Sindi.